Spring is maybe here, so how did we get on with our newly installed Woodwarm Fireview Slender 5KW over the winter? It was great (pun resisted)!
We chose the “slender” model because we were limited to 5KW for our room size, but most 5KW stoves are quite small – whereas we wanted a full “widescreen” fire! The Woodwarm Slender range are shallower than normal, meaning you get the overall width for a nice looking fire (and decent size logs) but can have a stove small enough to only output 5KW. Any more than that and the living room would feel like a pizza oven! The stove itself looks good – timeless styling without looking twee and “country-cottage”.
We had to gradually build up the test burns, the first being just a handful of kindling – then second and third burns progressively larger. This cures the paint on the stove, and has the unpleasant side-effect of stinking the room out. Once the stove was fully operational it has performed really well, not much more to say really, it burns wood, it burns coal, it gets hot! The instructions go through how to use the vents properly, using the lower ones like a choke on a car to get it started, then gradually closing it and also reducing the upper vent to get a clean burn. Not sure if we’ve fully mastered it yet but once the fire gets going it is very easy to maintain. We attached a magnetic thermometer to help regulate the temperature in the “optimum” burning zone.
Cleaning out the stove is easy enough, the ash pan slides out the bottom section using a detachable handle – although it’s surprising how quickly the ash accumulates! All of the handles on the stove look nice, but they small and quite stiff, so require a fair bit of strength to turn – plus of course they get very hot so use the supplied tool!
All in all, very pleased with it! Our living room looks loads better, and feels MUCH warmer – a grate* choice!
*I failed
Barnacle's Choice 
Hi, I’m considering buying the same burner and have a question: can you stock it up, shut it down and it will last the night, so that you just need to open the vents in the moring to fire it up again?
* Warmest(!) thanks in advance for your time and reply!
Ian
Hi Ian, Sorry but I haven’t actually needed to try that. I’ve noticed it’s still warm in the morning, with some glowing coals and embers. However you’d probably need to be quite careful how much you shut down the vents at night – as you risk putting the fire out. Some experimentation would be required!
That’s great, thanks for gettng back to me so quickly, much appreciated!