Rayburn wood burning cooker

[andrew]

Hello all - I've been looking in to the Rayburn woodburning stove (http://www.rayburn-web.co.uk/58_205.htm) and was wondering if any other members have experience of using this type of cooker/backboiler?

I've got a suspicion that while I love the idea (economical, greener, not dependent on Russian gas but my own fuel!), the reality of my lifestyle will mean it'll turn in to an expensive, time consuming white elephant and I'll end up with an electric cooker plugged in for convenience! Basically during the week I leave for work at 7.30am, and am usually not home until around 7pm at night and wonder if I'll then have to wait another hour for the thing to come up to temperature before being able to use it, and would it stay fuelled if I was out all day?

Any experience others have and can share would be much appreciated!

Thanks

Andy

[RichardKing]

I think that with the Rayburn-Aga company you will be paying for the name. I came across the Mescoli wood fired cooker at www.bioenergy.org Alternatively there are a lot of cheap chinese copies of old fashioned cast iron stoves which have a hotplate on top. Fitting a backboiler to a stove is very easy. I bought a stove & separate stainless steel back boiler from a little company near Heathfield. Ran pipework up to a radiator in our bedroom upstairs. No pump because it just circulates as hot water rises. Cast iron cuts very easily with a hole cutter, install back boiler (just a small tank) inside stove, run pipes out the back of stove up to radiator (or coil in a hot water tank). You will need a header tank, ball valve, vent etc. If you dont understand it then get a plumber.

[Henrietta]

We were lucky enough to move into a house some years ago with a Rayburn mark 1 cooker already in place. It would have been made to burn coal, but works very well with wood. My experience is that it would probably not last through the day, but that the top of the stove would be ready to use in about half an hour from lighting. I light the Rayburn every day which only takes five minutes. This stove is very small and the firebox doesn't take very big logs but it heats up quite quickly. A bigger stove will probably keep the fire in longer but will take a lot longer to heat up. I do all my cooking on it and it also provides oodles of hot water. We don't have gas laid on to the house and the electricity bill from December to March this year was £110. During the winter, the stove is alight most of the time, but in the summer I tend ti light it to cook the evening meal and then leave it alight to heat the water. This is where a solar panel would help.You could buy a new Rayburn or look at one of the second hand ones on Ebay. A new back boiler is about £100 which you may have to fit to an old one.