Electric inserts for fireplaces
October 10, 2022 8:42 PM Subscribe
We have an old fireplace that we'd like to put an electric insert into. There are a lot of options and they look pretty cheap and cheesy. Is there anything out there we should consider?
We mostly have ignored the fireplace which currently is something out of a halloween nightmare- lots of soot and spider webs hidden behind a couch. We are having someone come out to cap the chimney for moisture/draft (they inspected and it is in fine shape) and after that it'll be solely for looks.
We plan to clean it out and evict the spiders, and then we'd like to put in an electric insert (not gas, for reasons). We are in the US and have access to some fireplace shops as well as Home Depot and Lowe's. We looked at the options and the fake flames look very cheesy and it's hard to tell if they actually would be good for zone heating.
Our goal with an insert is both zone heating, electric heating as an alternative to our gas furnace, and also for looks. Any suggestions from experience or alternative ideas we aren't considering?
We mostly have ignored the fireplace which currently is something out of a halloween nightmare- lots of soot and spider webs hidden behind a couch. We are having someone come out to cap the chimney for moisture/draft (they inspected and it is in fine shape) and after that it'll be solely for looks.
We plan to clean it out and evict the spiders, and then we'd like to put in an electric insert (not gas, for reasons). We are in the US and have access to some fireplace shops as well as Home Depot and Lowe's. We looked at the options and the fake flames look very cheesy and it's hard to tell if they actually would be good for zone heating.
Our goal with an insert is both zone heating, electric heating as an alternative to our gas furnace, and also for looks. Any suggestions from experience or alternative ideas we aren't considering?
You are correct that most options for electric heaters are going to look cheap and cheesy. That's probably because in most situations these heaters are not a good idea — they use electric resistance (glowing wires) to produce heat, which is the single most expensive way to heat space. It's probably two or three times the cost of the gas heat you'd be replacing. By contrast, electric heat pumps are half or one third the cost of electric resistance, but you can't install a heat pump as a fireplace insert. So if you want to switch to electricity to avoid the carbon impact of gas, go to heat pumps. (And consider where the electricity is coming from — is it generated by burning gas, or from some renewable source?)
posted by beagle at 7:59 AM on October 11, 2022 [1 favorite]
posted by beagle at 7:59 AM on October 11, 2022 [1 favorite]
In addition, locating the heater in an old fireplace is probably an inefficient location. Cut a piece of plywood to fit the opening. Shove some fiberglass insulation up the chimney, back the plywood with insulation, paint it, use some glue to hold it in place. Or, if you want it to look like a fireplace, stuff the chimney, put in some pretty birch logs, maybe some nice candles.
Lots of people have scraps of new insulation, check buy nothing and freecycle.
posted by theora55 at 8:10 AM on October 11, 2022
Lots of people have scraps of new insulation, check buy nothing and freecycle.
posted by theora55 at 8:10 AM on October 11, 2022
Best answer: We replaced an old wood burning fireplace insert with a Dimplex electric insert. That was the only brand I saw that wasn’t uniformly cheesy and ugly.
We got a multi-fire xd, but I would’ve preferred a revillusion or optimyst model, they seemed more realistic. They didn’t fit the space I had, though.
They won’t necessarily fool anyone into thinking it’s a real fire but they look nice out of the corner of your eye. You really need to see it in person to evaluate though.
Ours does have a heater - a blower above the purely decorative fire. It can warm the one room it’s in, but as mentioned above, electric heat is very not efficient and we just run the furnace and only use the insert as decoration.
posted by mmc at 11:13 AM on October 11, 2022
We got a multi-fire xd, but I would’ve preferred a revillusion or optimyst model, they seemed more realistic. They didn’t fit the space I had, though.
They won’t necessarily fool anyone into thinking it’s a real fire but they look nice out of the corner of your eye. You really need to see it in person to evaluate though.
Ours does have a heater - a blower above the purely decorative fire. It can warm the one room it’s in, but as mentioned above, electric heat is very not efficient and we just run the furnace and only use the insert as decoration.
posted by mmc at 11:13 AM on October 11, 2022
Best answer: Yeah, stop burning things for heat. It's not the 19th century!
We have a Dimplex Revillusion that looks pretty nice. The fake tile background looks legit and the illusion of the flames is created with a clear plastic sheet set in the middle of the "logs" rather than being projected on the back surface of the insert, so it looks more realistic.
The heater aspect of it is a bit disappointing; it performs (and sounds!) like an under-the-desk space heater you'd get for your office cubicle. But as others have said, you can heat your house with your heat pump (or furnace, if you must) and only turn the heater on for a little extra coziness by the fire. Traditional wood-burning fireplaces are notorious for being very inefficient for space heating anyway, in addition to the other drawbacks, so I don't see that as such a downside.
One word of warning is that any electric insert is supposed to be on its own circuit. We were lucky to have an outlet close enough to the fireplace that we could just run the plug to, but the correct way of doing it involves drilling through the brick or floor of the firebox and running a dedicated circuit to the insert.
posted by HE Amb. T. S. L. DuVal at 12:02 PM on October 11, 2022
We have a Dimplex Revillusion that looks pretty nice. The fake tile background looks legit and the illusion of the flames is created with a clear plastic sheet set in the middle of the "logs" rather than being projected on the back surface of the insert, so it looks more realistic.
The heater aspect of it is a bit disappointing; it performs (and sounds!) like an under-the-desk space heater you'd get for your office cubicle. But as others have said, you can heat your house with your heat pump (or furnace, if you must) and only turn the heater on for a little extra coziness by the fire. Traditional wood-burning fireplaces are notorious for being very inefficient for space heating anyway, in addition to the other drawbacks, so I don't see that as such a downside.
One word of warning is that any electric insert is supposed to be on its own circuit. We were lucky to have an outlet close enough to the fireplace that we could just run the plug to, but the correct way of doing it involves drilling through the brick or floor of the firebox and running a dedicated circuit to the insert.
posted by HE Amb. T. S. L. DuVal at 12:02 PM on October 11, 2022
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It's nice for heating the room that it's in (which is probably less than 400sf, although I did not measure it, and which has closable doors that seal it off from the rest of the house if they wish). They like it reasonably well, although primary heat for the house is propane (rural property) but at least this way they heat the entire house to a lower temperature, and then use this thing to bump up the temp in the room they're mainly occupying (having thick blankets etc. for the bedrooms). It does seem to work as zone heating for that use.
One feature they remarked as being useful was a timer, which they set so it goes off at bedtime. They did specifically say that some units make "crackling" noises, which struck them as being absurd, and potentially irritating (I remember this point because we all had a laugh at the idea). They also specifically mentioned going shopping in person to specialist stores (not HD or Lowes) so that they could see the display in person (being that they preferred a minimalist display, it was important to see it in real-life and fiddle with any options).
Purely as a guest, I would say that the insert was (and this is an odd thing for me to say because it goes against my reflexes) actually more aesthetically pleasing than, say, an oil-filled heater from DeLonghi. They were themselves quite pleased about it, which is why I know any of the above (it was a topic of conversation). I cannot recall the manufacturer, alas.
This is slightly off-topic buuuuut: in some jurisdictions once a fireplace has been taken out of service it cannot legally be restored to wood-burning. I mention this simply because in some areas of the country this makes fireplaces a selling point in those homes which are still allowed to do it.
...which is why, although I do not ever use my fireplace, I haven't taken it out of service and switched to gas or electric.
posted by aramaic at 9:47 PM on October 10, 2022 [2 favorites]