Esse W35 range cooker

3 flames

The Esse W35 has a thermostatically controlled boiler with an output of 33,000btu's.

More reviews for Esse W35 range cooker (page 1 of 2)

• Not Happy

  Peter Diamond 2 months ago

  I installed a W35 about 10 years in my New House. I could see hairline cracks in the enamel of the top of the cooker.l very soon after installation . I called to the factory after exhaustive
  phone calls and they fobbed me off with saying it was dampness on the top of the cooker. A lot of crap as I had never even boiled a kettle on it. I still have not done so I only use it for heating water. I thought they would at least supply a new top free of charge but No Joy with that either. It does burn a lot of wood.
  ...[ read more ]
  Overall rating:

  3.5 flames

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• It will burn everything

  2 months ago

  If you are hoping to be able to cook and bake on this oven don't waste your money. I bought an electric esse 15 years ago, and was assured that it cooks in the same way as a conventional range
  cooker, with no direct heat source in the oven...........absolute rubbish, the oven has a huge electric heating element at the top of both ovens resulting in the same cooking results as you would expect from a baby belling. I have spent 15 years trying to find ways of stopping everything from burning but have given up. It will provide you with the most uneven cooking temps the back of the oven is hotter than the front and everything will burn on top as a result of the oven grilling everything whilst it cooks. Don't waste your money, it looks nice but cooks terribly.
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  Overall rating:

  4 flames

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• Ok once you start living with it

  Ian Langston 3 months ago

  The first and most importantly is that this is not a gas or electric stove and therefore you must understand it to get it to work well. Cleaning is important if you want the cooker to work
  well. We have used our SE now for 10 years. Good wood management is essential and dry hardwood is the best. A good draw on the chimney is essential We have found that the cooker side soots and cokes very quickly and have therefore become experts in cleaning the flus. Living in very rural France where the majority of heating engineers want to fit closed systems; in fact I rejected our first guy as he did not understand the dangers of closing an open system. In the end I had to design our own open system which with some discussions with Esse has worked well. Our system drives nine radiators which get too hot to touch. The system incorporates a 350 L thermal store. It is important to drive the cooker hard to get the best from it and keep it clean. It does eat wood, however after you learn what wood to use and how to load it, it’s not that much of an issue and of course your getting heating, water and cooking. If I had a grumble it would be the quality of the enamel which doesn’t seem as tough as that on Rayburns.
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  Overall rating:

  3 flames

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• Esse 905 WN wood range cooker

  Philippe Nozay 9 years ago

  We had an Esse 905 WN wood burning stove installed 2 years ago, and I am very happy with it. I initially had to clean the front every day due to soot but now we are putting the logs in the low
  oven with the door slightly open (to get the steam out) to dry them even further. After oven drying the logs, for 6 hours, we don't have any soot issue anymore and the chimney is pretty clean.I empty the ash tray every 6 weeks only. During the day it is our only form of heating during the winter and we can cook with it for free! Just add a couple of logs in the firebox before cooking, leave the firebox door slightly open for 2 minutes to get the new wood to burn well and I get very good heat in the oven and hotplates using this method and clean chimney. It is a very good complement to our solar panels/induction hob/electric oven that we use for cooking during the summer. In Winter, there is no other green/off grid alternative that would work with no electricity (solar panels don''t produce during Winter). I didn't go for the water boiler because I think you would need to have the stove on all the time for this to work as otherwise it would take longer for it to get to cooking temperature as it would need to warm up the water first and there is less to go wrong with a standalone cooker (no pipe leak, boiler to replace...), also I wouldn't have enough wood to heat up thousand of litres of water a year that end up down the drain! I am very happy with it.
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  Overall rating:

  5 flames

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• Don't buy Esse if you live in a country area!!

  Simon Walshe 10 years ago

  My Esse cooker is out of warranty and nobody will travel to the Cockermouth area to repair an electric Esse range cooker - Esse said they didn't have anyone prepared to come out. - which isn
  't very good.
  ...[ read more ]

  Stove expert replied: The repair of this stove is due to take place tomorrow and the part has been offered at a discounted rate through Esse direct. Esse can supply a chargeable service visit including call out fee labour charges and mileage if required.

  Overall rating:

  1.5 flames

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  • 474 This is helpful 297 This is unhelpful

• All may not be lost......

  Christopher Disney 10 years ago

  We too were driven to despair by our Esse W35 and had decided to ditch it. It struggled to get the oven to even Hot and left lots of unburnt charcoal behind every burn. It was a pain.I tried
  one last clean to original new condition and discovered two new requirements: first, the right hand smoke channel needs to be cleaned more than you think. Ours was partly blocked at the rear, its wider than you think. Make sure its squeaky clean right to the back and clear the muck out via the between-the-ovens slot. Secondly, clear the air intake at the left hand base of the firebox. Esse don't even mention this in the manual but there is an air intake down there controlled by the thermostat. Clean out the firebox then undo the L-shaped plate, pull out the lower left firebricks and lift out the perforated steel plate. Clean out any ash until you can see the air opening and the thermostat plate operating behind it.I don't know which of these two operations transformed the stove's operation but it has worked perfectly since: rads warm/hot and oven routinely 175-200 degrees vs 140-150. Give it a try.
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  Overall rating:

  3.5 flames

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• Esse-- Very disappointed

  David Loneragan 10 years ago

  I am writing from Australia, and the Esse stove we bought has been a HUGE disappointment. I have operated wood burning stoves before (the wonderful local stove "Everhot"which we used to heat
  water and bake bread), and also various wood fired heaters. The Esse runs our 4 radiators well enough, but we have NEVER been able to use the oven. We use what we think is probably properly seasoned wood, but the stove seems to need cleaning every 3 weeks. Every time you open the door, a lot of smoke does come out. The fire has no draught/draw to the firebox at all. After only one year, one oven door spring failed, and the hinge covers for the hot plate covers came loose. Very disappointed.
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  Overall rating:

  1.5 flames

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  • 471 This is helpful 348 This is unhelpful

• Disappointed in France

  Ian Carr 12 years ago

  W35 installed 4 years ago, it has never worked as well as the manufacturers promised. It constantly sooted and tarred up even with dry wood. We contacted Esse UK and the French official agent
  installers returned to see what was wrong. They were not helpful (although we ran several wood-burning central heating ranges with no problems aver the last 30 years) we were treated as novices. They refused to do anything to resolve the problem. Perhaps they didn't know what to do! Eventually, just recently, we removed the "grid" supposed to reduce smoke pollution which is at the top of the firebox. The range now draws much better and soots up far less, but still the oven never gets very hot and we can only run a towel rail and three radiators. Enamel now flaking off the top.
  ...[ read more ]

  Stove expert replied: We have received an email from the installer who states that they undertook a site visit where they did a de-coke on the system which took 8hrs. They found that a failure of providing a thermal bypass as they recommended to the customer and the use of wet wood with a moisture content greater than 25% has led to the system not being able to operate successfully. After cleaning the system they tested it and had the oven up to 220 degrees and all 7 radiators were hot. The puddles of brown liquid produced were from condensation and due to wet fuel and a cold boiler as there is no thermal bypass. If these are corrected there would undoubtedly be a big improvement in the stove operation.

  Overall rating:

  1.5 flames

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• esse wood burding cooker

  Lucas Armstrong 12 years ago

  After buying the Esse wood burning cooker brand new and using logs 5 years old and dry, this stove was the worst thing I have ever purchased in my life. After 1 year of living with smoke I sold
  it lost 3 thousand pounds. I was doing this wrong and that wrong I was told, I then bought another at a lot less money and it has worked like a dream without changing a thing.
  ...[ read more ]

  Stove expert replied: You do not say what the replacement was. Seems strange that one stove failed to worked effectively while another works well in the same flue system. Smoke back into the room is normally due to a poor draw on the flue system especially if the wood is correctly seasoned.

  Overall rating:

  0.5 flames

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  • 477 This is helpful 375 This is unhelpful

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