Damp / Will Woodburner help?

[flowera]

We've recently bought a 1860s Victorian brick farmhouse that needs some refurbishment. There is a problem with a damp cellar and evidence of tidemarks about 1' up the walls in the room above. Indeed, the flooring timbers all suffered from wet rot and were completely replaced during the last year. The damp only affects the cellar and the one room above.

I've had the drains surveyed etc. and the general opinion from our surveyor is that the damp is coming from below - possibly high water table/well - diagnosis still underway.

Anyway, I noticed that the air vents to the cellar were completly blocked - I've fixed that easily enough and there is now plenty of air circulating. However, I suspect that alone wont be enough to help the damp dry out. The room above is quite small (12' x 12') and has a fireplace in to which I was thinking of installing a woodburner which would help heat that side of the house but hopefully take a lot of moisture out of the air too.

Does anyone have an opinion on the effectiveness of such a stove in an attempt to keep damp at bay?

Alan.

PS - This is a great site. I've taken a day off work to read all the forum entries on 'damp' alone!

 

[Gervase]

Any stove that helps air circulate is a good thing, and the woodburner is just such a beast - so, yes, it will help a damp house. It won't cure the damp, but once you've got the ventilation sorted and looked outside for evidence, it can only help (and it's a cosy thing to have).
However, as the stove will be in a room above the cellar, unless you've got hugegaps in your floorboards, you may find that a modern dehumidifier works better (you can hire one for a couple of weeks to see how it fares).

 

[L1zzy]

Days off to read the post eh?? mmm food for thought ......

Just my 2 penny worth I have a wood burner and frankly its the most fabulous beast absolutely packs out the heat within 30 minutes of being lit - in fact the cottage isn't big enough to cope - so my advice would be yes go for it.