People living in Sheffield are the most cavalier wood-burning stove owners in the country, according to one of the UK’s leading online retailers of stoves.
Figures from Gr8Fires.co.uk covering sales since January 2009 show that more replacement stove glass is sold to the Sheffield postcode area than any other part of the UK.
Gr8Fires.co.uk’s customer support manager Adam Fowler explained: “Stove owners have to replace the glass in their appliance when a crack or hole appears.
“One of the most common causes of glass breakage is over-firing, which is when too much fuel is added or too much oxygen allowed into the fire, causing the stove to operate at too high a temperature.
“Cracks can also be caused by adding too much wood, then closing the glass onto a protruding log.
“Burning the wrong sort of fuel on the appliance is another cause.
“For instance, household coal is too volatile for use in the confined space of a multi-fuel stove and can cause mini-explosions that will break the glass.”
Sheffielders appear to be more prone than citizens anywhere else in the country to breaking their stove glass and consequently needing to replace it, but Adam isn’t sure why.
He continued: “Obviously, the old stereotype is of Yorkshire people being tight with their money, so I suppose the idea of over-firing your stove to wring every last kilowatt of heat out of it tallies with that.
“But I’m sure that’s not the case here – it is probably just a bit of bad luck that Sheffield currently tops our charts for buying replacement glass.
“If the people of Sheffield take care with what they burn on their stoves and how they burn it, we will see them drop down the list and keep their stove glass in one piece for much longer from now on.”
The Top 10 Replacement Stove Glass Sales Locations
1. Sheffield
2. Newcastle-upon-Tyne
3. Birmingham
4. Cardiff
5. Glasgow
6. Peterborough
7. Nottingham
8. York
9. Swansea
10. Aberdeen
