i just bought this coalbrookdale darby from someone and i am perplexed on what i can do to replace the firebricks i bought a manuel that will arrive at the house in a couple of days but i need
the measurement which i know i can get its the thickness if i have that i can cut my own please hlp anyone also i have to take the stove aprt to do this this seems odd unless im wrong
Our Darby came with the house and it was the previous owners main source of heat, it throws out such a phenomenal amount of heat. I grew up with solid fuel Agas & coal stoves and this is so
easy to light in comparison. The firebox is huge and I love the fact thatn it will take solid fuel as well as wood, which means that I dont have to burn quite as much wood - it can really devour logs! Fantastic in a power cut as not only does it keep the place warm but I can cook on it to - it's great for slow cooking. The airwash is rather useless though unless cleaned very regularly as it clogs up and I'm lucky if it stays in overnight, but I'm about to replace the rope seals so maybe that will help. I'd buy another.
we use our Darby already 43years.
best investment ever.we are from Belgium since the uk is out of Europe its not possible anymore to buy spare parts .
otherwise our Darby was indestructible.
My wife an I bought an old house in 1992 from an old widow who died. The house is like an open space of about 100m2. The main heating system was the Coalbrookdale Darby that was there since
10 years. 27 years later we still use this stove as main heating system which we still see very practical in modern environment. My wife works home so she has the task to refill as needed. The stove is much used with woods, pellets of wood and lignite bricks as mixed depending on type of heat we want. Very robust, quite efficient ! We had to replace the internal bars one time. The lateral stones have been removed so we have more reactive fire, and we can use woods of 60-65 cm ! That''s a very astonishing high quality stove that we hope not to be forced to replace. Difficult to find so robust equipment today, which can be efficient for more than 35 years !
Stove expert replied:
Great comments for this product.
To add to my post of last year here is an update on improvements I made to my Coalbrookdale Darby that gives a better secondary burn. I added a one inch layer of Koa wool insulation to the top
plate (baffle). I introduced pre-heated secondary air below the baffle. but found it did not improve the burn enough to justify the loss of space in the firebox. Next heating I intend to install 1 1/4" fire brick in place of the factory brick and line the grates with fire brick and save a space to let the ashes fall into the ash pan. With the small improvements I have made on this stove and chimney, and using well seasoned hardwood I have reduced my wood consumption from five to eight full cord per year to three to five. I live in a well insulated 2500 sq ft old farm house in up state New York where the winters can get bitterly cold and windy, My Darby is my sole heating source. as I said before I love this stove.
I installed this unit in1995. It is connected to 300 lt. h/w tank with DHW coil. It has electric backup if required. The water is circulated to slab heating coils but will not heat the whole
slab. The house is large 2 story 180m2 each level and this is our base heat supply. We do not use electric element on to the tank in winter. I modified the grate by using the coal grate bars and then laying 25mm thick fire brick on that with about 20 x 10mm holes for primary air. this greatly improved wood combustion. This heater has been very good with little maintenance.
I have used this stove for 12 years. The Darby likes to be run hot. With good gaskets and a proper drafting chimney this stove is hard to beat. When run properly and with well seasoned wood
this stove will produce a secondary burn and emit little or no smoke. The glass will only get dirty on startup or if you let it cool down too much on re-loading (which will easily wipe away with a piece of newspaper once the stove gets back up to temperature) The way this convection stove works is great It keeps the air in the house moving to eliminate hot and cold areas. I have operated this stove from 50F to -20F and as you can see I love it. The best way to get this stove going is with a top down fire.
Forgot to mention in my review the only improvement I made to this stove is I replaced the three glass panels in each door with 1600 degree F pyro-ceramic glass and removed the metal mesh.
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