How to restore & FIT this cast-iron fireplace?

[medianewbie]

I have a Victorian house with a (sadly gloss white painted) marble fireplace but, upon opening it up, no insert. Chimney now swept. Sweep advises an insert as when the wind changes the smoke blows back down the Chimney.
I've been given as a barn find. Anyone know if I should clean it (looks like someone has started but given up) & if so, what with? It is cast iron not brass I think so does it need re-'blacking' rather than cleaning (it's got the odd spot of rust). The tiles are ok (I've seen nicer) rheu slide our but I'm guessing I need to clean / replace before I fit it. Does it need backfilling with cement?

Pics would help ...

This is the space I want to put it in ..

The tiles should slide out and can be replaced. There are catalogues for vintage replacement tiles, so you can choose something more to your taste & ebay these. You need a 'firebrick' for the back. It comes in one piece & is moulded to shape. Your local fireplace shop will stock them, obviously you need a specific size. To clean up the metal you need stove polish. Mine came in a black/yellow striped tube and you squeeze a bit out like toothpaste and rub it well in & buff up. (wearing gloves).

I don't know about smoke blowing back down the chimney, we had some special addition fitted to the chimney pot to stop that.

Where you have rust, carefully clean it with stainless steel wire wool, until there's no brown; it may get slightly shiny. You may wat to use some rust remover:

jenolite.com/

You can black it afterwards. They have the rust converter stuff, which I haven't used for ages, but I don't think it's very good. I've used it on old motorbikes before and before long, rust had reappeared and bubbled the new paint off.

Want, not "wat"!

I think you need to fit some sort of fire cement around it . There must be some information online on how to fit a fireplace.
I can remember putting two fireplaces into an Edwardian house and a relative fitted them. You can’t just insert the surround without some firebricks/ cement around it.

Thank you all.
I've now found a pic of my fireplace, circa 2000, being used with no insert, so I wonder if it's the chimney cap that's the issue (re blowback) ?

I didn't know that you could get new tiles for them. We have four very similar cast iron fireplaces.

We have a very similar fireplace to yours OP, with identical tiles (which I’m not convinced are genuine Victorian). Before we installed it, we cleaned the cast iron surround with Scotch pads, but didn’t use fire cement with the tiles, we just put them in as they were. Have been thinking of changing the tiles for vintage ones.