Matesz - Masonry heaters : designing, building, and living with a piece of the sun

ADVANCE PRAISE FOR
Masonry Heaters

In Masonry Heaters, a rich and wonderful book, Ken Matesz sweeps away the ashes of our ignorance about the right relationship to fire. He argueswith quiet and crystal-clear claritythat masonry heaters are the most intelligent, gentle, efficient, environmentally friendly and sustainable, beautiful, and healthy form of heating humans have ever known. There is more knowledge and truth about masonry heaters between these two covers than has ever before been published in English.

ALBIE BARDEN, Maine Wood Heat Company

This book is a joy! Ken Matesz guides us on a clear path through the woods to getting an heirloom masonry heater, and offers invaluable information on why we should want to traverse it. Readers will learn about much more than just masonry heaters along the journey, however, including how their house works (or should work), and how to have their own radiating energy source at its centerincluding exactly what it takes to get their masonry heater designed, built, and burning. Not to mention some wonderful stories about the people who have made masonry heaters a part of their lives! May the sun shine on this book.

TIMOTHY SEATON, President, The Alliance
of Masonry Heater and Oven Professionals

This book should be on the required reading list for anyone wanting to become a heater mason, or for anyone planning to install and heat with a masonry heater. Matesz has captured the true beauty and user-friendliness of these exquisite heaters, and, with ease, helps guide readers through the process of designing a beautiful, and functional piece of the sun for their homes. I highly recommend the book, as well as masonry heaters.

TOM STROUD, founding member and former president
of The Masonry Heater Association

A wonderful book! Well thought out, well grounded in nature, and delightful to read. When I visited a house built around a masonry heater, it was a just right experience, and one I have never forgotten. This book is a great introduction from a man who obviously knows and loves the subject.

DEBRA LYNN DADD, author of Home Safe Home

When I travel in the northern states of the U.S.particularly New England, where most people depend on heating with oilI fear for those millions of folks for whom depleting, climate-changing fossil fuels are all that stand between winter comfort, on the one hand, and death by freezing, on the other. Masonry Heaters explores one of the most promising alternatives, and its message needs to get out far and wide, and fast.

RICHARD HEINBERG, Senior Fellow, Post Carbon Institute, and author
of The Partys Over: Oil,War and the Fate of Industrial Societies

Masonry heaters provide a quiet comfort that must be experienced to be believed. In this book, Ken Matesz shares his love of masonry heaters and artfully explains how they work, how to use them to provide efficient and comfortable heat throughout the day, and what it takes to install one in your home. This is a truly delightful book.

DAVID BAINBRIDGE, coauthor of The Straw Bale House
and coauthor of Passive Solar Architecture

Masonry Heaters is informational across the board, and shares common, advantageous characteristics with passive solar design. Both methods of heating rely on heat transfer by radiation rather than convection, which gives a more natural feeling while reducing drafts and noise; both utilize thermal mass, which gives greater thermal stability; and both can allow independence from energy shocks and price fluctuations. I highly recommend this book for peoplein any fieldwho are interested in learning about the design, construction, and use of this superior system of heating.

KEN HAGGARD, coauthor of Passive Solar Architecture

MASONRY
HEATERS

Photo courtesy of Tulikivi Corporation.

MASONRY
HEATERS

Designing, Building, and Living
with a Piece of the Sun

KEN MATESZ

CHELSEA GREEN PUBLISHING
WHITE RIVER JUNCTION, VERMONT

Copyright 2010 by Ken Matesz
Unless otherwise stated, all photographs and illustrations copyright 2010 by Ken Matesz
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be transmitted or reproduced in any form by any means without permission in writing from the publisher.

Project Manager: Patricia Stone
Developmental Editor: Cannon Labrie
Copy Editor: Laura Jorstad
Proofreader: Eric Raetz
Designer: Peter Holm, Sterling Hill Productions

Printed in the United States of America
First printing August, 2010
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 10 11 12 13 14

Our Commitment to Green Publishing
Chelsea Green sees publishing as a tool for cultural change and ecological stewardship. We strive to align our book manufacturing practices with our editorial mission and to reduce the impact of our business enterprise in the environment. We print our books and catalogs on chlorine-free recycled paper, using vegetable-based inks whenever possible. This book may cost slightly more because we use recycled paper, and we hope youll agree that its worth it. Chelsea Green is a member of the Green Press Initiative (www.greenpressinitiative.org), a nonprofit coalition of publishers, manufacturers, and authors working to protect the worlds endangered forests and conserve natural resources.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Matesz, Ken, 1964
Masonry heaters : designing, building, and living with a piece of the sun / Ken Matesz.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references.
eBook ISBN: 978-1-60358-311-4
1. Stoves, Masonry. 2. Dwellings--Heating and ventilation. I. Title.

TH7436.M37M38 2010
697.22--dc22

2010019837

Chelsea Green Publishing Company
Post Office Box 428
White River Junction, VT 05001
(802) 295-6300

www.chelseagreen.com

TO MY PARENTS, JOHN AND RUTH,
WHO TAUGHT ME THE VALUE OF WORK DONE WELL.

CONTENTS

This masonry heater has an oven (the upper, arched door). The heater is finished in finely detailed stucco. The customer wanted a relatively conventional fireplace look blended with a five-sided corner-heater design. Three sides are visible here while the two back sides fit squarely in the corner.

My brother, Howie, and I became Boy Scouts in the late l950s. Aside from mastering every imaginable knot on our side-by-side steel bedposts, scouting for us was all about camping, and central to the camping experience was Fire. We learned how to find dry wood and tinder in all weather conditions and how to build safe campfires. Early in our scouting journey, we entered a fire-starting competition using flint and steel. We studied the literature, found our flint and steel, and cooked old shreds of cotton sheets in a metal Band-Aid can in our moms oven until the cotton was bone-dry and black. When the fire-starting competition was held indoors at the wooden-balconied junior high school gym, one of us struck the steel against the flint. The other caught the live spark in a nest of black cloth, carefully folded the cloth over the spark and swung the cloth in circles high and low like a windmill until, in only seconds, we had fire in our hands and won the contest. We did not realize at the time that we had also caught the fire in our hearts.