Kirsten Jones

I forgot to mention, we need it to do our hot water too (most of it anyway) we are a family of 3

Just re-read and there is obviously a difference between a rocket stove and a rocket mass heater. I’ll check it out, thanks.

Thanks for the help and advice!  
We are in Cumbria, North West England (mostly wet😄 sometimes cold)
If anyone has any direct experience of using the Ecco stove it would be great to hear it. I’ve heard very conflicting opinions on them!
We are definitely going to go in for breathable insulation and insulation will be a focus as our current home isn’t well insulated at all, being old. Thanks for the pointer to the rocket stoves, I’ve heard a bit about them but would definitely like to learn more. Our only concern about building something ourselves is that the barn we will be converting will be on a 99 year lease from an estate and we may be required to have heatas certification as part of the lease (maybe not as my parents lease from the same estate and didn’t bother when they did their conversion and it was never a problem) we are waiting for the terms of the lease so we don’t know as yet.

Hi, We have been looking at various options to heat a barn conversion. We have used wood burners as our sole heating for 20 years in both a live in vehicle and an old, badly insulated house. We are about to convert a barn and want to stick with a wood system as wood is something we can access, but we would like a system that is more efficient. We are out at work all day so we are not able to keep feeding a wood burner through the day. We thought a batch burning system such as a masonry stove or Ecco stove might work better for us and get more efficiency out of the wood.
does anyone have any experience of using either? They are very expensive options. Are they all they are cracked up to be? Is there any other system anyone would recommend for heating what will hopefully be a well insulated, open plan barn with a high ceiling in one part (we are concerned about this aspect)
The barn is open plan, one floor with a mezzanine. Approx 100m2 including the mezzanine.