Future prep fire place during renovation for stove on budget

cormie

Hey folks,
My friend has recently bought an ex council house and it's in need of a good bit of fixing before they move in. The eventual wish is to one day have a stove. From my previous thread here, it seems the best option is a clearview stove with a 904 stainless steel flu. The problem is, they don't have the budget for this now, but they want to have the fire in action over the winter.

They are also knocking down the diving wall between the kitchen and sitting room which will leave the chimney as the centrepiece between the two rooms. The wall itself is supporting and all I know is that it needs some steel reinforcement to be able to knock it down. I'm not sure exactly where this will go yet.

It's a typical 2 story house, so a chimney length of about 8m. They got it swept recently and the sweep said the lining is in good condition and should easily handle a stove, although I know a 904 lining is the best practice.

Ideally, they would like to have the chimney and stove area prepared now at the same time the wall is being knocked down so it's future proofed for a stove and not to waste money installing a fireplace for an open fire.

The entire downstairs is about 35m2. You can see a plan in the attached image. The actual chimney is 1026x458, but I was thinking it would be better to have it extended maybe 150mm on each side, possibly just at the front so there's room for a nice projector screen and then maybe small corner shelving behind it for the kitchen. A front appearance maybe something like this: http://www.clearviewstoves.com/php/cropper_image.php?type=header&id=5 with the mantelpiece sticking out, thinking something like in the attached "stove.png" file?

The fireplace had been covered over and plastered and you wouldn't have even know there was a chimney there from the sitting room, after removing the plasterboard, it appears to be a typical open fire size. There is however some piping running down the chimney from the hotpress cylinder in the room above.

So what I'm thinking, given the limit on budget and the work on the wall being done, is to just prepare the fireplace for a stove to go in and get a cheap stove in the mean time (second hand for less than €100) to sit in and be used with the existing chimney. Then when budget allows, upgrade to a clearview and get the 904 flue installed properly and sell the old stove on again?

Also, for a non backboiler stove, what kinda KW clearview stove would be needed for a 35m2 downstairs area?

Any opinions, feedback, warnings or advice would be greatly appreciated!

whizbang

Good luck getting a second hand for less than €100.. They usually sell for more than the new price.

Most important is an external air supply while you can.

Run loads of electrical conduit everywhere. In a similar situation i know, virtually everything that moves gets plugged in near here. Future TV needs lots of wires. And keep the plumbing also.

cormie

Thanks for the reply. I don't mean a clearview stove for less than €100, just a regular stove to use until they can afford a clearview months/years down the line

Any suggestions where to put the external air supply? I believe there's a vent in the sitting room already.

Do you mean to run electrical conduit around the fireplace, if a tv is going to end up over the fireplace and have other gadgets and things plugged in there? They aren't planning to get a TV, maybe a projector, which would then be on the same side the stairs is, projecting onto the chimney area, again, this is way down the line when they can afford it.