Natural Field Stone for new construction fireplace???

[Piston]

Next year my wife and I will be building a new home up in NH.  8)

One very important thing for us, is having a large, central fireplace.  We plan to heat the home with a wood stove through parts of the winter (not entirely, but whenever we are home we like to have a fire going)

We have an abundance of old field stone on the property.  I would love to use this field stone to build a large chimney, I'm thinking 4 flues, one for a fireplace for ambiance only, one for a wood stove on the main floor, one for a wood stove in the basement (that will eventually be finished) and one for the furnace.  

I know it is very expensive to build a large chimney/fireplace, but is the majority of the cost typically the labor, the materials, or split pretty much half and half?  We really like the 'natural' stone look of the fieldstone.  Another bonus is that many of the stones have fairly flat edges, plus they're already in large piles.  There is one pile of stone about 3' high, 28' wide, and 70' long.  There are two other piles about 10-15' in diameter and 5-6' high.  The piles are easily accessible and not far from the building site.  

Does this sound like a viable option?  

[WH_Conley]

Check with  member Thomas-in-Kentucky. He did pretty much the same thing. Here is a link to his blog with pics. Might take him a while to get back to you if you send him a PM. He seems to be a pretty busy guy these days.

[Piston]

Here are the only 3 pics I have, not too good unfortunately.

[Holmes]

The stones will make a great looking chimney. For the mason you will need to sort out the ones you want used and gather them to near the chimney,  probably 4 to 6 tons of stones. New codes now require fireplaces to have air tight doors installed on them with combustion air piped in from outside. Just a thought but a large central chimney with 4 flues in it is a large cold to very cold thermal mass sitting inside your house in cold seasons, especially in NH.       Holmes

[Piston]

Just a thought but a large central chimney with 4 flues in it is a large cold to very cold thermal mass sitting inside your house in cold seasons, especially in NH. 

Holmes, I'm a little confused by that?  I don't know much about chimney construction so forgive me  :D
From what I've read, I thought a large central chimney was a good thing, because of all the thermal mass, so once it was heated up, it would stay heated and give off a lot of heat for a long time?  This is one of the reasons I want to use a really lot of stone. 
Most of the chimney will be in the house, except of course 6' or so to be high enough over the roof peak. 

Is it bad to have 4 flues in a large chimney?   ???

[thecfarm]

I suppose you know the rocks will have to be cleaned and maybe dried? May even have to take a brush-power wash,clean all the moss and dirt off. Will be quite a job just to dig and sort the rocks form the one that are just right to the ones that are no good.But once you was done,it would be beautiful looking.  ;D  Well worth the time.By the way too.I have no idea where this chimney is going,but I have a 3 flue,one for the fire place,one for cook stove and one in the basement for the oil furnace. Kinda goes up through on one side of the peak of the house. Have the oil furnace one up by the peak,the fire place one next and than the wood stove one is the lowest one on the roof. If I would of had the wood stove flue up by the peak would of been real simple,easy to clean it. The one I have to clean is 6-8 feet down the roof and 6 feet high. It quite a bother to get at. I did not have build it,but I could of had the furnace on the other side of the basement. Would not of mattered.I did not give it a thought until I went to clean the chimney. 

[Holmes]

 I capped the tops of my flues to my fireplaces. I do not use them. In my thought process the cap helps to hold the warmth in the chimney and the cold out.
     If you do not burn wood all the time the chimney mass will be cold, or it will be absorbing the heat from the house.
  Have you considered a Finnish fireplace / stove. Installed properly they are a great heat source and like spray foam insulation will pay you back for as long as you own the house. Holmes

[LOGDOG]

I'm glad this topic came up. It's been on my mind lately as well. You know, of all the tutorials available on the internet and YouTube, there is really a shortage of tutorials on building a stone fireplace from the ground up. I wonder why that is?

[pesaventoc]

I just spent two of the last four years building a random field stone fireplace.I had no previous experience in masonary of any type. I  just wanted to do it. I read everything I could find on stone masonary, ordered ten tons of tennessee field stone and cut a whole in my cabin floor and started. I had the footing already poured when the foundation was layed. I made a lot of mistakes but learned as I went. Doing it on hit and miss weekends, I fitted rocks like a jigsaw puzzle trying to keep a one inch  recessed mortar gap for a rustic look. I have small cabin so I built mine on a modified Rumford plan where the flue is roughly over the firebox. It has a Lymance top damper so I'm not letting cold air down in the masonary when there is no fire. My firebox is firebrick bonded to a 3/16 gap with masonary cement which should last as long as the fire brick. I built the firebox first, added the surround,then backfilled with solid mortar.Before I backfilled ,in order to allow expansion of the firebox and later the flue I coated both with agricultural  vermiculite mixed 50/50 or so with morter to make a styrofoam-like coating that also helped insulate the box and flue. You are right to have a separate flue for each source. It'a fun and addictive  and satisfying project, but by yourself it's slow..... There is an excellent tutorial on the national brick association web site on design that can be applied to stone.If I can get my computer savy wife to help me with the tutorial I will post pics of my fireplace. Good luck Charlie

[Al_Smith]

A little on this .Some years back a buddy of mine did in fact build a large fireplace/flue system in NH for his sister .

He is now living in N Carolina  ,retired but at that time he was a masonary contractor in Ohio .Even with his years of experiance it took him nearly all winter having to fly in for a day or two of working every month .

The end results were stunnng but field stones are very labor intensive .

[JohnG28]

My home that my wife and I just purchased has a large field stone fireplace.  A previous owner was a local mason and had worked on some parks in our area where there was a lot of stone. As I understand it that was the source of the stone for the fireplace.  It surely took some time to piece together but the result is really nice looking and really makes family room.  I will post some pics later when I get home.

[shelbycharger400]

i know the 3 flue, all brick chimney with clay fire tile liners, at parents house,  in the center of the house,  where only about 2 to 3 ft stuck out the roof. it was cold year round!  that is a lot of mass to heat up.

[Piston]

I can't imagine building one myself!  I give you guys credit that do it all on your own, sounds like too much heavy lifting for me to be motivated! 
I am already dreading the thought of moving all that rock and sorting through it and cleaning it!  I have the tractor and backhoe to help me move it but it will still be a lot of manual labor to sort through the good and bad. 

As mentioned I'm curious how much something like that would cost for the labor?  Probably one of those questions that can't really be answered without specifics such as location, time of year, design of chimney and all those variables but I figured I would ask. 

I guess I really need to look into the theory behind the chimney and thermal mass, I really thought that the more thermal mass you have inside the house, the better it will stay heated.  It makes sense though that cold air can (and will) leak down the unused flues and cool down the surrounding stone from the inside out. 

[red]

i have seen a thermal mass from finland where the firebox is in the basement and has a bread oven usually made with a lot of soapstone  a name something like tuvlikia ovens

[red]

tulikivi  and search thermal mass wood stoves

[thecfarm]

I have a 3 flue chimney with a fireplace too,clay liners and all.We had an old cook stove for heat and we was nice and warm. This was one of those stove with a fire box just about as big as a shoe box. I would start a fire in the stove in the cellar when it got in the single numbers. We was nice and warm for 5-6 winters. I would not worry about the mass.You want it,do it. But remember farmers put the big rocks on bottom and the small ones on top. I have piles in the woods that look like mostly small ones. I got into one pile to build a road across a wet hole. found some good size ones in there too.

[Al_Smith]

Oh pshaw Mr Piston .Good heavens man you're only less than half my age .Besides that it's a one shot deal ,done is done .You never have to do it again . Too much nagging wife,trade her in .

[Piston]

Oh pshaw Mr Piston .Good heavens man you're only less than half my age .Besides that it's a one shot deal ,done is done .You never have to do it again . Too much nagging wife,trade her in .

:D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D

[pesaventoc]

And when the house burns down you have a monument to yourself ;D

[LOGDOG]

After this thread started a few days ago I called a friend of mine in East Texas. He and his father were stone masons. Very good ones at that. He left masonry to go to work as a landman for Chesapeake Energy. Anyway, I told him I wanted to learn stone masonry and I'd pay him to teach me. (We live about 100 miles apart so I figure I should make it worth his while to come all this way for however many trips it takes.) He said he'd gladly teach me but my money is no good with him. So he says I should find a small project that we can start with and when these triple digit temps clear out of here we'll do it. I think I'm either going to do an outdoor grill project or a stone foundation for a new well house back by my pond. I'm looking forward to it. 

[Mooseherder]

Great topic!
Looking forward to everyones progress.
I would like to learn more about these methods for some future projects also.

[Al_Smith]

It's pretty sound advice to gleen some information from a good mason .With a fire place it must have a venturii built into to it else it won't draw right .You about have to get it right because it would be a chore disassembling 10 ton of stone afterwards .

[pesaventoc]

Logdog you're a smart man. There is a satisfaction in teaching yourself and it does prepare you to learn, you will save yourself time and headaches watching a master at work. When I was up sixteen feet in the air on scaffolding, I finally
decided I was doing no one  any good 16ft down and a rock bouncing off my head. So I hired a stone mason to do the last 10 feet . I was his mortar mixer and rock toting grunt for a week. I kept saying to my self, if only I had known this stuff six tons of rock ago! I didn't make any major mistakes but I could have done in half the time.

[Al_Smith]

There's a guy locally ,Kenny B. who among other things was national number one for 2-3 years in a row in the Go Karts years ago .

Well he's got a lot of money ,very successful farmer and  business man .He built an addition to his home that looks like a giant  medevil hall .24 foot cathedral ceiling and the largest stone fireplace I've ever seen .With the help of a skidloader that thing will take an oak stump or two ,no kidding .Once lit those things will burn the entire celebrated 12 days of Christmas .There has to be 20-25 tons of stone in that thing

[Piston]

LogDog,
That sounds really interesting and a great idea!  I can't say I wouldn't be very interested in learning some masonry.  I honestly would love the accomplished feeling of building my own fireplace/chimney but with all the other work there is to do with a new house I just don't think there would be time for it.  Plus I would hate to start a new chimney and only get it half done  :D