We installed our stove over 18 years ago and have never regretted our choice of stove.
We would leave to door to the sitting room open and th heat would permeate through the whole house, so
much so that the central heating would shut down.
The only repairs needed were two sets of fire bars and a piece of "glass" for the door.
It would slumber for 12 to 15 hours and during really cold spells it would be kept lit continuously for 3 to 4 weeks.
Having just moved to a new build property which has oil fired central heating and is extremely well insulated, I am seriously considering installing a Highwayman 7 to be our main source of heating due to the massive increase in oil costs which hasn''t happened with solid fuel.
I bought the Dunsley highlander 5 sg after a lot of research I do love it but it has one negative It looks great, the riddle system if fab, easy controls, throws out lots of heat but the only
down side is that it won't close down air tight over night.My previous fire which was a fire line had its own problems but it used to shut down nearly air tight on a night. I could put coal on and next morning the coal would be still black and Hardly touched and would still be ok until the next afternoon but with the Dursley slider system the fire still burns quite strong when shut down and next morning I find all the coal burnt and nearly out.I am no engineer but I can see the problem.The sliding bars are loose and the bars that slide over the slots don't cover them completely. I can't believe a company like Dunsley who have been in business all these years, have not come across this yet.I am going to get an engineering friend to alter my fire to get it to close down better, as I think this will save me a fortune
Stove expert replied:
There is guidance in the manual for this type of problem. Too high a flue draught, controls not set correctly, not enough fuel etc. Do bear in mind that any alteration to the stove will invalidate your warranty. There should always be some air being allowed into the firebox to maintain a clear glass, to insure that the flue system does not become blocked with a build up of tar deposits and to prevent condensation etc. It would be best to get the flue draught reading checked before making any changes / adaptations to the stove.
Like most log burner owners I spent a very long time researching my weapon of choice. I was originally going to go for the Morso Badger that my brother owns (and is happy with), but aside from
the eye watering price I found that the controls weren't as intuitive as the ones on the Dunsley. My wife also didn't like the look of it as much as the Dunsley, so the Morso quickly became a non-option.Back to the Dunsley, I couldn't be happier with it. Mine is the ''high leg'' version, which actually isn't that high, just standard looking really. It's a very solid looking and feeling stove, and weighing in at about 80kg took two of us (me and a pal) to carry it in, red faced from the car. The construction is a mix of cast iron and steel. That worried me at first as I'd read that cast iron is ''better'', but the Dunsley mixes the two well. The door and grate are cast iron, whereas the body of the unit is a very thick steel construction. The benefits are two fold - the cast iron parts wear less than steel would (the grate being exposed to a lot of heat needs to be hard wearing), and the steel parts are extra thick for durability, but also heat up quicker than cast iron does so the heat gets into the room quicker. Mine is the Dunsley Highlander 5 Enviroburn, to give it the proper name. The Dunsley Highlander 5 doesn't actually exist anymore - the Enviroburn is exactly the same as the original, but has holes in the back wall to let in a bit more air. This has a couple of benefits - it means that unburnt gasses will now be burned off, producing less smoke (and making the stove suitable for smoke control areas), and also means your flue gets clogged up much less, because there's less unburnt stuff going up there. Win win. You can however easily blank the holes off with an included blanking plate (attached to the back of the stove). After calling Dunsley to discuss why you'd want to do that though I decided to leave mine as it came. I'm glad I did because it makes the fire all the more nicer to look at as the jets of air come through the holes on the back wall and swirl the flames around. Lovely.Cleaning and emptying is a a breeze. As it's a multifuel stove the grate can be opened or shut depending on the type of fuel you're burning. The ash pan is located neatly underneath the grate and is very easy to remove. Another stove we looked at was the Jotul F100, which is a wood only stove and does not have a separate ash tray. I don't think cleaning that stove would be as easy as with the Dunsley.Operating the stove is very straight forward. Compared to the Morso which has just one air control lever, the Dunsley has 2. One for primary air intake (bottom), and one for secondary air intake/airwash (top). Each has a very simple slide mechanism located on the front of the stove, and is very effective and easy to control. The air controls can be fettled with minutely, and you'll soon get used to how yours ''likes'' to be run.As it's a 5kW stove it doesn't need a separate air supply, which was a nice bonus.So all in all a very nice stove. It's robust enough that I expect it to last a good couple of decades. Incidentally parts aren't expensive either. With the price of a replacement glass window at about £30-£40 online it won't be too costly to repair if anything does go wrong. The only potential negative - although it doesn't bother us - is the sounds the stove can make. Because it's of steel construction it will tick a bit more than a cast iron stove does as it's heating up and cooling down. Some people like that though and I think it adds to the character of the stove. When the air vents are fully open the top ones can whistle a little bit, but that soon goes when you close them down when the stove is up to temperature. For us the sounds are a positive. I guess if you were looking for a completely silent stove you wouldn't be considering a log burner anyway.The handle is also not detachable. Some stoves like the Morso have detachable handles so you don't burn your hand. At first we used the included tool to open the handle, but found that to rub on the surrounding paint work and worried that it'd eventually rub off. We quickly found though that however we open the door we'd need gloves for whatever came next! So now we've done away with tools entirely and just operate the handle with a glove on, ready to reload/prod/whatever.Hope that helps!
Stove expert replied:
Well explained comments for this stove which seems very pleasing to the customer.
Got my stove at a great price second hand but did need quite a lot of refurbishment. All I can say though is the stove has been great, kicks out the heat. I do still have a bit of trouble getting
it to slumber for any length of time, perhaps its not ideal for this, and the glass does often get a little smoked up.But I think that is common with most 5 kw stoves.The riddle grate on the stove is probably one of the best on the market, robust and covers the whole bottom of the stove , better than say the tiny one of the Stockton stovax 5. The ash tray is deep too, good for smokeless coal.You can tell its a well designed and a super value for money stove, from how the thick cast iron door closes smoothly and flush.The controls are also good, but I do find I am often messing with the stove every hour to either turn one up and down, its not like I can just leave it there by itself.The one thing that impressed me the most however was Dunsley Heats after care service. As iIneeded to get replacement fire bricks, rope and glass they really went out of their way to help. They even gave me some parts for free as I went in person and they gave me great advice.In today''s world they really stand out as a company that actually helps their customers and are proud of their stoves.
Stove expert replied:
High praise for the Dunsley Company and their product.
Bought the stove as used off of internet after reading reviews for months. Final choice was based on cost and reviews. We absolutely love it, we burn both logs and smokeless fuels, smokeless
mainly to keep the burner going all night, by morning it's still warm and glowing. Heat output is brilliant, we live in a traditional 3 bedroom Victorian terrace and although it doesn't heat the whole house (we didn't expect it to) we placed a small electric fan adjacent to the door at high level, this pushes the excess heat into the hallway, we have found we are not using our central heated as much - great savings. Anyway, would I buy this stove again, definitely. On another note, prior to getting installed into the chimney breast, the stove was left in the hall and we both commented that it even looked nice there. We both said it would be really nice to have it working there as a centre piece and in the location I would imagine it would really warm the whole house. Would be interested to hear from people who have done this. And again, we love , love love it .
Stove expert replied:
Stoves are put in large hallways for heating the whole house (if not fully but taking the chill off), the main consideration is the clearance required and providing the hall is large seems to make perfect sense.
bought new 5 months back started using approx mid November 15 . had a Tiger and a Jotul in the past. Dunsley lights very easily and stays in all night with ease on Homefire Ovals in fact stoked
up 8pm and left till 4pm next day and after a quick rattle on shaker lever it started up again with a hand full of sticks. even the Mrs, who was dreading going back to the stone age loves it. oh and having thought at first that I'd bought the wrong one i.e. too small it heats up down stairs with all doors open
This stove has proved why it has such good reviews - it's so economical and you can burn it at the rate you want - ticking over or roaring. It's so quiet and efficient - you wonder if it's on
!With both controls closed it still outputs good heat. However, you do need to read the instruction book to get the best out of lighting and controlling the burn.We chose the Environburn Model with the Solo door and higher legs - it's great looking and sleek. It has a clear ceramic door and you must not clean this with water or it will get a crackled glaze look. Leave the airwash slightly open to clean the door - the black soot will clear to view flames.The handle does get hot but it is easy to open and close.The firebox is big enough for three good sized logs, which will burn for two or three hours.Use dry kindling wood to start it as it can smoke with wet or green wood.It's easy to clean and remove the ashes.We had it installed by a local fitter who took the hassle out of getting the stove and installing it - and provided a beautiful granite hearth - all at a competitive price. The installation was trickier than expected and there were a couple of hiccups but the installer sorted it out quickly. We were impressed with the follow up service and response.All in all - a great start to the winter - exceeding our expectations.
We bought and fitted the Highlander 5 stove in spring 2013, spent the usual (long) time looking online and at local stove shops and ended up selecting the Dunsley Highlander 5.The stove hasn
't skipped a beat since install and we have it fitted into our large lounge measuring 18' X 16' X 11' high and it does a great job, it doesn't heat our hall or upstairs with the lounge door open as soom people might think. We live in an old 1902 semi-detached house with no cavity wall insulation etc...The Highlander 5 lights easy and gets up to temp within around 30 minutes or so, I source/supply/chop/cut/dry all my own wood with three separate log stores in back garden, I'm very much into it. On rare occasions we use coal which you can just about keep the fire in overnight,we would use one bag of coal per year. The Highlander 5 is very economical to run on wood in our past 2.5yrs experience, about every 90 minutes or so just add a couple of bits of dried wood and blast it for a few minutes then turn it down to tickover mode, brilliant.I find if the glass soots up its best to clean it with a piece of newspaper and ash from the pan which does a good job of cleaning it. We run the Highlander 5 stove from around October to March without any faults, six months of it burning virtually every night from about 5pm to midnight and it's excellent, can't fault it one bit, we have a large wicker basket to store wood for the stove that sits in the hall under a table and we use properly dried wood. We bought a £50 stove fan that sits on top of the stove to help dissipate the heat around our lounge. We get our flue cleaned once per year. We're on the verge of installing a Burley Brampton (8kw) stove into our large dining room (high ceiling) which opens up into an 'L' shape kitchen area and downstairs hall etc, so hoping the heat from the (well respected) Burley Brampton will help heat our cold downstairs area.Overall; the Dunsley Highlander 5 is a wonderful wood-burner and is very well made, we've had it installed 2.5yrs now and its been hassle free and does a great job of throwing out heat.
We took on a house in the Highlands with a Dunsley Highlander 7. The backboiler heats the water (if given most of the day and a medium sized tree to burn) and the remainder of the heat goes
to the living room.I've had wood burning stoves for years, run a sawmill, burn plenty of wood and process a great deal more. You can give it as much tinder dry firewood and time as you like, it will never reach the temperature zone of best operation (as indicated by the flue thermometer). It barely functions as a room heater, so it is being ripped out next week and replaced with something bigger and far better.
