Is your home freezing cold over the winter months? Are you looking for an economical way to heat your home?
What about heating your home if you live off-grid?
As for us, wood heat could be the exact solution for your high energy bill and uncomfortably cold house. A wood stove is economical, warm, cozy, and doesn’t require you be to be on-grid to enjoy it.
A wood-burning stove is such a beautiful, old-fashioned way to provide warmth for your home, and it’s easy to install.
We recently installed a wood stove in our home and had no issues with the installation process.
Here’s how we installed our wood stove:
You’ll need:
- Wood Stove
- Chimney kit
- Silicone
- Roofing nails
- Basic tools
- Three 2-feet pieces of stove pipe
- Damper
- Stud finder
- Tape measure
- Sawzall
Intro to Installing a Wood Stove
These instructions may sound overwhelming if you haven’t installed a wood burning stove before. You must realize, a chimney kit makes life a ton easier.
Some heavy lifting will be required with maneuvering a wood stove. However, most of the chimney kit and stovepipe are pieces which fit together like a puzzle.
You must secure a few pieces, but for the most part, they merely click together in place. My husband is the construction pro between the two of us, but even I was surprised at how easily the kits went together.
So be encouraged, to those who aren’t familiar with this process. Please remember when in doubt, ask for help from a friend with experience or a professional.
Also, you'll notice I don't touch on the proper setting for a wood stove. Many times, people will put tile under their wood stove and hearty backer behind it.
We haven't made it this far on our wood stove yet but will be installing these items shortly. Be sure you follow all codes to make your wood burning stove legal to prevent fires and not have any issue with obtaining home owner's insurance with a wood stove.
1. Where Should the Stove Go?
When installing a wood burning stove, you must first pick a stove. The biggest concern people run across when purchasing a wood burning stove is buying one too large for their space.
Be mindful of the square footage you'll be heating because if you purchase too large a stove, you'll find yourself opening windows and doors in an attempt not to cook inside your home.
We went with an older wood cookstove because the price was right, the wood box was smaller to keep us from cooking in a small house, and we like the way it looks inside our home.
Once you decide on the stove, spend time determining where the stove should go. Once the stove is in place, it’s a permanent fixture.
Therefore, decide where the stove would be best suited. Check with your state to see what requirements the stove must meet to be up to code.
Most states require a certain number of inches from the wall. You should also decide where the stove would be most efficient with putting out heat.
Some people prefer the stove to be on the bottom level of their home because heat rises. In our case, our house is small, leaving us with limited space to install the stove.
2. Position and Measure
Once you’ve figured out where you’d like your stove to go, position the stove. This will show you where the stove will be and how far the flue pipe will be away from the wall.
Be sure to measure the distance the flue pipe should stand from the wall. The same measurements can be used to measure on the ceiling.
From there, transfer the measurements to the ceiling and mark where the pipe will go.
3. Pilot Hole and Tracing
Drill a pilot hole from the center of the drywall where you marked where the pipe will go through the ceiling.
The hole should go through the drywall, into the ceiling, and up to the roof. Pull the trim piece out of your chimney kit and trace around it on the ceiling.
Cut the hole for the area you traced on the ceiling.
4. Head to the Roof
Once you have the hole cut through the ceiling, it’s time to head to the roof. Place the flashing over the pilot hole in the roof. Be sure it’s centered.
Trace where the flashing goes. It should be a circular pattern. When it’s traced, cut what you outlined.
When the hole is cut on the roof as well, remove all insulation between the hole in the ceiling and the hole on the roof.
Once the insulation is removed, you should be able to see straight through.
5. Install Chimney Support Kit
Our chimney kit came with a chimney support kit. You may need to install a support for the chimney support kit to have a place to attach the support kit to.
In this case, you should attach a couple of 2×4’s to the roof rafters to give you an area to connect the chimney support kit.
When you’ve installed the chimney support kit in the roof, finish it out by attaching the remaining parts to the ceiling inside the home.
6. Install Flashing
Flashing is interesting to install because part of it has to be under the shingles on the roof and part should be on top.
Pry up some of the nails holding the shingles on your roof. Slide half of the flashing under the shingles and secure with silicone.
The other half of the flashing should still be loose on top of the roof.
7. Put Chimney Together with Flashing
Begin to interlock the chimney inside the flashing. Level up the chimney before nailing the remainder of the flashing in place.
Use roofing nails to secure the rest of the flashing.
8. Install Storm Collar
You’re now ready to install the storm collar. Silicone the storm collar on top but be sure you use high heat silicone.
9. Add More Chimney
Once the storm collar is in place, you’re ready to piece the chimney sections together. I only had to use three pieces of chimney pipe, but the amount of chimney you need may be different.
Again, my house is small. Do your research to know required heights deemed by your state as legal. Click as many pieces of chimney pipe together until you reach the legal height.
Install the chimney cap and spark arrestor once the chimney is in place.
10. Install Damper
You’re ready to move back inside and install the damper. Decide what height you’d like the damper to be at.
Drill two holes (one on each side of the piece of stove pipe) to install the damper flap inside the stove pipe. Insert the handle through the damper flap and stove pipe.
11. Cut Stove Pipe to Length
You’re now ready to cut the stove pipe sections to length. The goal is for the stove pipe to slide over the stove adaptor and fit on the flue of the stove.
Once you have the measurements for the pipe to fit accurately, cut, and slide into place.
12. Light Test Fire
At this point, your wood burning stove installation is done. It’s time to light the test fire to see if you have a proper draw. We lit a small piece of paper and placed it into the firebox.
We watched to see if the flame drew towards the chimney which it did in our case. If you don’t have a proper draw on your flame, it would be a good time to revisit each of the steps to make sure they were performed properly, and everything is put together correctly.
If it is, call a professional because you don’t want to use the stove if it doesn’t draw well.
A wood stove is such a treat, as not only does it provide heat, but you can cook on it too and create many cherished family memories around it during the deepest darkest winter times.
I hope this guide will help with your wood burning stove installation and that you may enjoy the warmth and memories it will create.
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This article first appeared on morningchores.com Original Article
