Woodburners, nice or nasty?

I would not be without mine. No houses close to me and a free supply of wood. I just have to saw it up. Two wood burning stoves and they heat the whole house and give me hot water all for free.

Wood burning stoves are great. Why have anything else when we have free wood? They are not too much bother to clean out and the heat they throw out is amazing, we have to open the sitting room door, as a consequence the heat keeps the hall and landing warm. Three cheers for them.

Cavemen were burning wood thousands of years ago. Today we have electricity, gas and oil but some people still like the caveman life.

Love mine. Live in a village with others who use them. Toasty warm, saves on gas heating. Only use proper dried wood but confess to picking up sticks from the woods to use as kindling. Ash goes on garden or on compost. Probably wouldn't have one in urban area.

I'm asthmatic too but no problems with our woodburner. I do replace the door seal from time to time: a simple job.

I live in a semi-rural area, but not far from the brickwork chimneys, so wood burners are the least of it.

However, I do have 16 trees which need keeping under control, so I am grateful that I have a neighbour who will burn my cuttings. We have a low height restriction on chimneys, so even though he is upwind of us, we never get any problem.

Given that my council will only take the larger pieces in general waste, so they end up in landfill.

The smaller pieces go into an aerobic digester for electricity.

If your neighbour's smoke is a regular nuisance, it is possible that it is not correctly installed, so it would be worth asking your council to check.

Love mine - always had one but we are very rural and have rights to any fallen trees/branches on the Downs. Never bought any wood for over 40 years. It’s very hygge as long as you have the new generation wood burning stoves. Save a fortune on heating and in power cuts we can still warm up soup/water etc

We live in an older house. We tried having cavity wall insulation but it was a disaster and had to have it removed. Narrow cavities and suspended wooden floors on an exposed site means our house is REALLY difficult to heat so yes - we have a woodburning stove or we'd freeze. We don't use it often but when we do, it's absolutely toasty in our sitting room. Thankfully, we're surrounded by fields and our 2 nearest neighbours (who have houses similar to ours) also have stoves.

It’s a no from me. Their contribution to urban pollution and health is significant.

We have two but we are very rural and we use it to keep our oil heating costs down.

ROMILO, I'm 100% with you. we live on a very dense modern housing estate and many of our neighbors have these wood burners. The air is choking in the winter, and can be somewhat fuggy even in summer. I feel for anyone with chest problems. As you say we dare not have the window open even a crack. Ghastly things IMO, even if they are quaint.

I loved mine, but can no longer lift anything much. Since I lost my partner I’m aware that ease is priority, so I now have a flame effect almost replica, but last night when it was feeling chilly, a flick of the heating switch was infinitely preferable to waiting for the fire to take, then burn through, before eventually giving off some heat!

My partner moved from a 300 year old house with only a wood burner for heating to a house with gas fired central heating when he was 64, he had lived in the house for 45 years, that was ten years ago, apart from the joy of waking up to a warm home, he doesn’t have to store logs, carry logs in every day, clean out the fire or worry about getting the flue cleaned every year, he breathes easier too, he says that he loves his gas fired boiler and certainly wouldn’t go back to a wood burner

Nasty. I cannot breathe unless it works efficiently and well sealed. Lung conditions.

I love my Woodburner. No one, but no one would stop me using it in the winter. I buy dry wood for it as there's really no point in burning anything else. I wonder how many of you complainers about woodburners drive non electric cars or have used petrol in the past, travel by air, cruise liners etc? Most people use woodburners in the winter so not sure why it would effect washing on the line / people who have their windows open etc

I’m asthmatic so would often have an attack in my own house if neighbours were using them and I opened a door or window.
Same if I’m out for a walk with the dogs even somewhere quite open.
We’ve just moved so hoping there aren’t as many near us now!
Like the look of them might get an electric stove when we renovate our lounge.

If you haven’t already, I would definitely recommend contacting your council about this. Good luck

We love ours in the winter and most people around us in this small market town have them too. They don't seem to cause problems.

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25Avalon

We often have power cuts in the winter so no ch until it comes back on. The wood burner is a godsend then and I can light the gas hob to boil water for a cup of tea.

That’s probably why we keep ours, “just in case” it’s got a flat top so we could cook if we needed to, that survival fear never goes away.

I have one and like it. I think that it's important to burn only seasoned wood.
It is heating from a renewable source.

We've had a smokeless zone for a long time.
I think they should be banned in town and probably everywhere eventually.

They really cause me to have fits of non- stop coughing. I'm asthmatic. Nothing can be done though.

We often have power cuts in the winter so no ch until it comes back on. The wood burner is a godsend then and I can light the gas hob to boil water for a cup of tea.

I like the smell of wood burning stoves. It takes me back to my childhood, I suppose (although it was coal fires for us). I’m not sure that I would want the faff of lighting and cleaning one these days, though, but as I say, I do like the smell of them.
As some posters have said, certain areas need them as access to mains gas and uninterrupted electricity supply isn’t a given. (Actually, we get frequent power cuts where we are and it’s not in an isolated place).