Wood or gas fire

We have a holiday home which can get very damp and chilly between visits as the thermostat is set to a low temperature. There's gas fire that looks like a log burner in the house, and once lit it gives off a lot of heat pretty quickly as well as pulling damp air up the chimney.
I don't think that we could be bothered with a "real" fire now, we had one in our last house which was lovely but there was space to store the logs there.
Our current home has no fireplace which I find a little souless, I wondered about having a stove-type heater which worked on electricity but we don't really need the extra heat so it seems a bit pointless.

We had one which was already in the house we bought, DH loved it playing with the logs and putting more on, I hated it as I found it messy and causing to much dust.
So we had it taken out and replaced with a marble fireplace and built in real flame electric fire, I like log burners just not in my house

The amount of ash a log fire generates is largely down to the type of wood you are burning 4allweknow, so perhaps the wood on your sons is not seasoned enough? I definitely only need to empty mine twice a week, and I’ve perfected the technique to remove it without mess. A properly fitting ash container, and a tie top bin liner which I put over the ash container before I tip it, I use my very old Shark to suck out the last bits of ash, when I replaced it I saved the old one specifically for the fire. It takes me less than five minutes.
It is cheaper to buy your wood from your local farmer, I’m lucky to live in the country though - and I keep it for at least two years before I burn it.

As I said in my earlier post, ours is a source of free heat, so unless anyone wants to pay me to remove it and then pay for an alternative source of heat, it'll be staying!

Oops, Also, wood is expensive and becoming more so. To save some money son buys a palletful at a time, all kiln dried. This then has to be stored and basketfulls brought in. Whole process reminds me of when parents and then when I was married had coal fires. As to fumes etc, modern fires are supposedly less polluting indoors but still emit a lot of pollutants out the flue. Personally I wouldn't have one.

Electric?

My son has a very modern, log burner fire and when I am in charge eg fir holidays I can assure you it needs cleaned out every day in winter. They have a covered tray type container for the ashes but when emptying in the bin there is dust.

J52

The latest DEFRA approved stoves burn clearly without fumes. Our wood burners, one multifuel, only require the ash being removed once, usually before relighting. We have an oblong canister which the ash tray fits into without allowing ash dust to spread, it is emptied outside.
I guess like most things it’s down to personal preference.

Yes we have a new one and it is really clean - we only burn wood and empty it every few days never daily. We have always had log burners as ‘commoners’ in our deeds we are allowed free wood from fallen trees.

Do you often get power cuts? Aside from the cosiness of a real fire, it’s an asset when the electricity goes off as you still have warmth. My friends in north east Scotland use it to heat water, milk or soup if the power is off, as it very often is in their neck of the woods.

Does anyone else have a stove fan? I have an ecofan and leave all the doors open, the fan sits at the back and gently wafts the warm air towards the door. The stove is in an inglenook, I have a new build

My ch gas boiler will be repaired tomorrow so I won`t be using the stove every day from tomorrow but honestly it has been a godsend

Couldn't be a*sed cleaning out a wood burner. Gas every time.

Thanks everyone for your input. It’s good to get different views. We have a real woodburner at our seaside cottage, so I’m fairly used to it but it is smaller than the one we would have here.
Dh doesn’t mind one way or the other (no help there);. The ac say definitely a real log stove.,
Still getting quotes so I’ll let you know the outcome. 🙏

Yes do it! ! I’m 80 and sort our log burner and it’s really no bother….easier than open fire I think. I’ve also got air purifier which reads air quality and if you burn kiln dried logs the air quality is perfect. Cooking is far worst than a log burner…. shows on our purifier.

I have a wood burning stove [Defra approved] and burn kiln dried wood throughout the winter evenings. I've no central heating.

I'm in a bungalow and with it burning well I can leave the door ajar and the heat can lift the temperature throughout the home.

It's one of the best items I've ever bought. I get in the wood from the garage every 4-5 days and empty ash once a week. No problem.

Wow gingster. Here’s mine!
Separated at birth?

We have a log burning stove. It is set in to the fireplace. I don't find it a hassle at all. I empty the ashes every other day, it's easy to light with a firelighter and a few kindling sticks and it heats our living room well. The heat radiating from the chimney helps to heat the landing also.

We get very little ash when burning well-seasoned or kiln-dried logs.

The advantage of wood is that it is independent of grids and pipework.We were very glad a of a wood burner when we were without gas for two weeks in November and had a winter of intermittent ssupply.

We could have used electric heaters but electricity is expensive and it was a house with big rooms. As it was we used the wood burner. We have moved, and are going to install aanother wood burner for the same reasons, guaranteed heaat if the gas or electricity go down.

However, we normally just light the wood burner on Sundays and holidays, so the cleaning and sorting, which only takes 10 minutes or so, isn't really a problem - and the wood ash is good for the garden. I wouldn't want a wood burner as my sole means of heating.

We love our wood burner - free source of heat for us - and there's very little mess involved. Wouldn't be without it now.

I don’t have gas, and hate electric fires, the fan noise drives me quietly mad. I’ve got a log burner, when the weather is cold it runs overnight damped down, and I empty the ash twice a week, so it’s really not a lot of bother. My only issue with it is that it’s harder to regulate, when I first had it, it was too hot in the lounge - there is an art to maintaining the best temperature for comfort.

We have an electric log effect wood burner. It is very pretty and looks like the real thing. Google electric effect wood burners and you will be amazed at what is available.
We had too many issues with the chimney in our Edwardian house which didn't apparently meet modern building standards. Im still not sure how previous occupants over the decades coped with the various coal fires and gas fires that used this chimney!

Fireplace

OP get the flue checked first, it should be done by any reputable installer and my fire would look so good in your inglenook

The latest DEFRA approved stoves burn clearly without fumes. Our wood burners, one multifuel, only require the ash being removed once, usually before relighting. We have an oblong canister which the ash tray fits into without allowing ash dust to spread, it is emptied outside.
I guess like most things it’s down to personal preference.

I have a big blueair air cleaner in that room. The air stays very clean with this fire and the colours on the blueair do not change from an excellent blue, whereas cooking in the next room triggers red, which is polluted. Modern fires have the bells and whistles to be clean burning, not like the old stoves and maybe defective flues in older houses