Flue liner or not?

[attractivebrunette]

I'm having a large hole in the wall fire installed. Several fitters have insisted I need a flue liner costing £1,000. Several others have insisted I don't need one.

All these fitters are supposed 'experts' with years of experience fitting fires. They can't both be right.

So, those that are insisting I need a flue-liner...are they doing so because they know it's unnecessary but they simply want the extra work? Or is it because I genuinely need one?

And those that are insisting I dont need a liner...are they doing so because they secretly know I really need one but that if they quote an extra £1,000 for the liner that I'll simply choose someone who insists I don't need one, because their quote will be much cheaper.

Help!!!!

 

[kirkgas]

the appliance manufacturer will confirm if it definately needs a liner, even if they don't demand one it MAY STILL need a liner if the chimney has been tested and is faulty, more info needed on make, model and location, before anyone can make a definate statement,

 

[namsag]

What size flue liner and length are they saying it needs and are they using scaffolding.

 

[attractivebrunette]

The appliance is a Studio 3 Edge open fronted fire. The manufacturer says either:

a) Connect a flexible 7" flue liner suitable for gas (in other words a class 2 liner)
b) Create a smooth transition between the top of the gather and the flue


The chimney has been 'tested' and is fine. It's a large chimney with sufficient 'draw' to allow the gases to escape.

I guess my question is, in what circumstances is a flue liner required? It seems, surely, that it's needed only if the chimney / existing brick flue, isn't sound. Anyone?

 

[Agile]

The appliance is a Studio 3 Edge open fronted fire. The manufacturer says either:

a) Connect a flexible 7" flue liner suitable for gas (in other words a class 2 liner)
b) Create a smooth transition between the top of the gather and the flue

I agree thats confusing.

I would think they may have meant to add the word "liner" to the end of the second sentence.

Why not telephone the manufacturer for advice on the correct interpretation?

Tony

 

[heatingman]

Fitted a Studio Edge fire recently, also known as a cassette fire. It was a shed load of work, 90% of it building. An enourmous amount of fireplace had to be removed to fit the gather hood, lintels to support brickwork. It also involved a 2 mtr length of 7" liner to connect the hood to the flue, again lots of work to get a smooth transition. If the flue/hood/liner are not right the thing will spill for England. There is loads & loads of work involved but the end result is brilliant. If you require someone to do complete job including all the making good and plastering don't expect much change from a £1000. It is not a 5 minute easy peasey job.

 

[attractivebrunette]

Ah, now we have someone who knows what he's talking about. You're right, it is a huge amount of work, most of it will be removing the existing brick-work to allow the burner and gather-hood to fit, as well as inserting lintels to support what's left (not much).

When you say 'spill' if it's not done correctly, do you mean the gases might escape and not go up the flue as they're supposed to? If that's the case then I guess for pure peace of mind, a flue-liner would be safest.

My question now is, does the flue-liner need to go all the way to the pot? I'm on the bottom of a 3 storey flat so doing it this way will mean someone fitting scaffolding to get to the roof to be able to feed the flue liner in from the roof, all the way down.

However, you seem to be suggesting that maybe only a few meters of liner is required to connect to the hood / spiggot, to ensure it's a good fit and no gases can escape, then this two meters just needs to go up into the chimney a few meters.

This is the fireplace and also inside the chimney. It's very large inside and I could almost climb up it myself

Untitled

• attractivebrunette
• 31 Oct 2008
• 1

Untitled

• attractivebrunette
• 31 Oct 2008
• 1

 

[heatingman]

There must not be any tight bends in the liner, nice and flowing/smooth. The brickcouse came out just short of the ceiling to enable us to get a nice flow up the chimney, partly due to it being ofset to the centre, which of course is where the gather is. The liner was formed into the shape and slid up the flue & dropped back down on to hood, then all sealed up. I worked on the theory that if I could still see through the formed liner end to end the bends were ok, shallow. Shame I didn,t take any pics.

 

[namsag]

Firstly reading the instructions for the fire make it as clear as mud which is where the confusion will be coming from.

Second Heatingman . Why did you only take the liner up 2 metres.

When a stainless steel liner is used on a brick/masonary chimney it should go all the way from the appliance to the terminal in one complete length ?

 

[attractivebrunette]

Why? This is my question, why does the liner need to go all the way to the pot? Why not just a few meteres?

 

[namsag]

Brick chimney large input fire around 13kw (44000btu size of a small back boiler) flue gases affect the mortar in the chimney bricks fall out cement falls out brick(s) lands on the top of the liner damaging it blocking it. What was originally a 7inch flue gets restricted down to 4 inch fire stops clearing products of combustion.
Money customer saved by not having flue done properly gets put towards there funeral by relatives

 

[ChrisR]

Dear original poster
given those instructions, call the manufacturer!

 

[attractivebrunette]

Well the manufacturer says one can either use a liner or not, I'm just confused under what circumstances a liner is required...

 

[namsag]

Thats the trouble with these fires on the web sites you can get up so much of the install details but not all, there are probably more that comes with the gather that must be fitted on the studio3.

They probably have two different connection one would go to a flue liner the other to a built in terminal type thing that sits on top and stops debri falling straight into the fire.



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EDIT ..On reading the service instruction and thinking about it if gather was fitted there would be no way of removing the fire from the hole and clearing any debri that would build up so i would take it the 3 needs a liner
############


There used to be an input figure above which a liner had to be fitted but not seen it anywhere for a while. As well as if the chimney was not of sound constuction

A lot of these fires are made and sold without any regard to how they can actually be fitted and a lot of the onus is put on the installer to decide which is why you are getting conflicting advice.

I for one would not put a liner in unless it went all the way to top with a terminal. 7 inch liner would be an absolute beetch to put down and is expensive to buy.

On another note have you bought the one that does not have a glass front as it is only 25% efficent and needs a 100cm vent . So it is purely for effect and you wont get much heat

 

[heatingman]

Namsag, had a very long chat with the studio people about the install of the fire, with the hood fitted to a liner and sealed into a stack any rubbish falls into the fire. The use of a liner ensures a smooth and complete connection between hood and chimney, which eliminates draughts, wind and air movements around/under fire affecting flue pull which could lead to spillage. The chimney I connected to was a perfectly sound 7" glazed construction (with no snots). The fire can still be removed from hood, major work, if a bird was to fall down a flue that was not directly connected to hood. The instructions I had did permit the hood to just poke up the stack, it was not recommened and they would not accept any calls to defective ASD or spillage on a FOC basis even in G/tee period. PS only one gather hood.