New Hearth,New Stove,New Ideas

[EMB5530]

Your proposed setup sounds safe and should be trouble free. Still sounds like overkill to me and I'm not sure the heat loss won't offset the gain. I would sooner do a full masonry stove for all that work.

Well, I think you guys are probably right as far a me going overkill...
But, I still want to do the rock behind the stove for the walls in the same manner(just for the aesthetics) but I will probably cut down on the floor and size down the piers but still isolate/insulate them from earth and the original footing of the house but still have them doweled into the original house footing. I can take thinner limestone for the floors w/ no problem, just have to go round it up which should be no prob as I have no intention of having this done b4 spring. Just need to have it all planned out so everything goes fairly smooth as I hate not having a plan in mind so I have everything ready.
Because there is nothing like being in the middle of tearing holes in your house and living over an hour away from what you need to finish it up.(Not that this has EVER happened to me.)
But as far as work is concerned... I guess you would hate to deal w/ me on a regular basis b/c I enjoy a good day of hard work. Oh, the things my wife has had to deal w/... Its the feeling ya get after you do something that "can't be done:" by one man, in that time, that way, or b/c its not possible.
Thanks for the help thus far.

 

[GENECOP]

Rocket mass heater........google it, seems like you like the thermal mass idea....forget the stove....

 

[aansorge]

You like the rock, that's cool and if its a hobby go for it! It just sounds like a lot of work and unnecessary to me.

I'd focus my efforts on getting a long burning stove to get your 12 to 14 hour burns. Think Blaze King or woodstock. Or at least think big. Getting 12 to 14 hour burns consistently and warming an entire house in windy Kansas requires some serious BTUs. Rarely are people upset by going too big on this site... It is generally the opposite problem.

 

[EMB5530]

Thanks for the opinions guys but I grew up w/ a wood stove and know what I want to accomplish and how I would like to get there. Just trying to iron out the specifics. Like I said though thanks it helps to learn more about some of this.
I am now just forced to make the final decision on the stove. I really like the Jotul Rangeley but the Pacific Energy Alderlea seems like a nice stove too. I think I like the Jotul's looks and the TL ability but the T6 just looks like a well built stove, a bit big but well built.

 

[Kosmik]

Well if that hearth was 4+ yards, that's easily 4+ tons of mass getting heated by a raging hot fire. Not all masonry heaters are of the design like Finnish Contraflow or German Kachelofens, where the flue gasses are being moved through relatively small, long openings to radiate their heat.
The more 'basic' designs out of E.Europe and Russia operate on the principle of it being more like a big stove or hearth, that gets heated up and then can radiate through the day...
Since a modern stove is insulated with firebrick, it will get hot, but not 1,000+ degrees like it would if the fire were being built in the rock.

Did your hearth look more like this than it did a fireplace?
http://russianart.files.wordpress.com/2013/07/russian-stove1963.jpg

 

[EMB5530]

Well its been 5 months and hundreds of hours of work but I am there.. The stove project is complete. I have scaled it back a great deal more than my original concept, in part because of the knowledge and expertise of some here and also due to the fact that my wife wanted a certain look for the room.
The weight of this is held up by a 2 yard footing that is doweled into the footing of the house. Instead of digging more large footings in the crawlspace I poured a pad 12" thick with 5 three foot deep piers and a thickened edge around the outside.of the pad. The rock wall that protrudes into the room is supported by an I-beam where the rest is supported by a series of trussed 4x4's and 2x10's in a similar manner to which I've learned to build decks for pouring concrete, but a little more overkill.

Pic 1 shows were the stove is going after I removed a small partition that was between the dinning and living rooms.
Pic 2 shows the first hole I cut in order to pour the concrete through.(Tried to keep it small for as long as possible so the house wasn't any more torn up for longer than necessary!)
Pic 3 Pretty self explanatory.
Pic 4 Installing heavy **** I-beam.
Pic 5 Shows the concrete board I put over the I-beam and 2x10's and the first couple of rocks.
Pic 6 Self explanatory
Pic 7 " "
Pic 8 The front is rock notched to fit slightly over the hardwood floors then I filled the void behind that w/ a flowable fill to support the rocks on the floor.
Pic 9 Setting heavy *** rock on grout.
Pic 10 The floor is finished

 

[HotCoals]

WOW,just wow!
Can't wait till see it all up and the stove going. Nice job so far.

 

[EMB5530]

Continue to the walls which took forever. I have never really tried to shape rock like this before so it was a learning experience.
I purchased a few feathers and wedges from trow and holden and a hand held bushing tool. Though I found that rather than use a bushing bit a needle scaler worked better than a bushing hammer leaving less deep bruises in the stone. Also I found that when I was going to split a stone that making a small cut the length of the rock where I wanted it split in order to not have to set the chisel each strike saved a lot of time.

I made the edge of the wall near the window taper back at a 45 degree angle which made splitting those stones time consuming. Depending on the location and shape I was trying to make some of the stones took as much as 8 hours to get to the perfect shape.(The wall that was exposed on both side was #ell to shape. And it really got your goat when you had 4 hours or more in and the stone cracked where you didn't want it to.) You can say I had a very personal relationship w/ each stone. If you were to point to a stone on that wall I can tell you the original size, shape and area where I found it.(As I went around to farmers fields and ditches and found and loaded up all those heavy suckers by hand.)

The 3rd pic shows my super hero helper son. He's really the one that moved all those heavy stones for me;-)

The 4th shows me utilizing the 2x4 that was part of the old partition that I was glad I didn't take out b/c I would have had a heck of a time setting those heavier stones on the grout evenly.

The 5th shows the flag stone I used for the mantle. I found it from a person that owed our family some money so traded him for funds due. It is supposedly from Arizona but I wouldn't know for certain. I just know I liked the looks of the stone. I used a skill saw w/ a diamond blade and a pump up sprayer wired to the guide to cool the blade. That stuff cut extremely hard.

The 6th is the Alderlea T6 getting moved into the house. Two words: BIG & HEAVY.

 

[HotCoals]

Amazing work and you even put a outlet into the stone!

 

[EMB5530]

Thanks Hotcoals. I will never do another task like this in the house as it made a heck of a mess taking the rock in and out getting them to the right size and shape. But I was thinking of a wood shed out of limestone someday.

 

[HotCoals]

You should be proud!
Did you seal the stone ?

 

[begreen]

Fantastic job. That is a super home for the Alderlea. You're going to love that stove. Please post a beauty shot with it burning when you fire it up. It should go into the hearth.com gallery.

 

[EMB5530]

Thanks to all for the nice comments.

I sealed the flagstone on top but not the limestone.