Please talk to me about AGAs

[MissyGirlie]

We're currently contemplating moving to a house which has a (not new) oil-fired Aga. Part of me remembers happy winter afternoons at a friend's house, after being out in the cold, sitting on the floor with my back to the Aga. The practical side is wondering about the cost and how easy it is to cook with (there is also an integrated electric cooker in the kitchen).

Do they really need servicing every six months? How is Aga oil different from standard heating oil (there is only one oil tank as far as I know, and the boiler runs on oil)? When do you turn it on for the winter and how do you decide to turn it off? And so on.

All advice and info welcome.

We serviced once a year.

Very expensive to run. Switched on in November and off about March/ April.

Lots of hob space. Ours had four ovens which were at various temperatures. You can't control the temperatures on the ovens - they are what they are. The fourth and coldest oven was more a keeping warm than anything else.

Don’t,

I actually moved house to escape an Aga.

Mine was Oil, ferociously expensive to run, constantly needing servicing, never really worked properly (would drop temperature so fast) and was seemingly impossible to remove. An Aga shaped gap does not have the same dimensions as a standard cooker, so removing it, aside from the dismantle / move quote of £1,500, would gave required digging out the concrete plinth and retiling the Kitchen floor. It would also require living with an ugly gap or replacing kitchen units.

On the plus side it does cook great baked potatoes and casseroles, gives off a lovely gentle heat and makes drying washing easier, but as far as I was concerned, that was it !!

The thing with Agas, I’ve concluded, is that they’re a whole lifestyle thing. If you base your cooking around their strengths (i.e. minimally use the hot plates, use the ovens for everything), plus use it for the kettle, making toast, ‘ironing’, drying clean washing, drying wet coats/shoes/horse rugs/dogs/children etc etc plus heating your kitchen, then they’re a bloody awesome workhorse. If you just want to use it for cooking, in the way you’d use a typical cooker with a gas hob and electric oven, then they’re a ruinously expensive monolith. I absolutely love mine, but I think you can probably guess what kind of user I am!

Thank you everyone.

On-off info handy, thank you - 5-ish months of ruinous expense rather than 12. I'm used to the responsiveness of my current cooker so the fixed temp will take some getting used to.

This is a 2-oven one, parked in an existing massive fireplace, in a big kitchen, so it's not taking up valuable space.

The idea of having a room that is consistently warm all winter is is vv tempting - our current house is old and draughty (despite our efforts over the years - our bedroom was a balmy 12C this morning). And yes, it would be used to boil endless kettles, dry the towels used to dry off the dogs, dry off the dogs themselves, dry out wet footwear/coats/hats/gloves. Also good for bread making, I would think.

It sounds as if it will be expensive but useful.

Can anyone explain the Aga oil/ standard heating oil thing?

Edited for typo.

When you buy oil, you just say you've got an Aga, so you get a slightly refined version or an oil with an additive. Your boiler can use it too, so no need for two tanks

Thanks, that clarifies things.

You could explore the option of having it converted to electric instead. That would give you more flexibility , don’t have to have all ovens on all the time etc

i think they’re great. Grew up with agas currently got a Rayburn ( no where near as good to cook on as an aga but it does all the heating and hot water) that’s multi fuel and my parents have an electric everhot. Everhots are the same size as agas very similar to cook in and much cheaper to run.
Whatever type of range cooker you have you won’t need a toaster or tumble drier. If you an aga/everhot you won’t need a microwave. I use a flat iron instead of an electric iron but drying clothes over the rail usually sorts out creases.

I agree with FreddieRocks
It's a completely different way of life, one where you appreciate and enjoy all the differences or one where it doesn't gel with you at all.

I've had mine, oil fired 2 oven, from new for over 30 years and love it, if I ever move, I'll buy and install one in the new place if it doesn't have one already.

I might well look into that. I need to work out how much other heating we'll need first, because if an Aga at £40/week can do the lion's share (we don't heat the bedrooms, and only heat the bathroom enough to dry the towels), I will really enjoy having a permanently warm room!

If on the other hand we spend a bloody fortune on additional heating, an expensive oil-fired Aga won't be sustainable.

Find out exactly what it does.

Ours heats our hot water all year round, we also use it for drying and airing laundry and it's great for slow cooking. It keeps one end of the house warm which means we only need our heating on when it's really cold. DH does the servicing himself and we have to do it every nine months or so. Taking all that into account I don't think it's expensive at all. We use about 2000 litres of oil a year (Aga and heating), averaging 55ppl which is quite a bit less than £40/week.

Converting it to electric turns it into something different. I did look into it and decided against it. We get quite a few power cuts here, which was the clincher.

Honestly I would rather have an old oil fired one , but they don’t make them anymore and we couldn’t have it installed in our cottage now as it would be truly bonkers.
I suspect you are right that our electric one will not be exactly the same , but I’ve seen many in showrooms and they are still lovely 😄.

i think it will still be a learning curve and hoping nobody in the house is planning on eating any time soon 🤣

I've had mine nearly 30 years (it was here when we moved in) and I do love it, but it's not suitable for every house that's for sure. We are also at home all day every day, so the heat does get 'used'.

I think you can get second hand oil-fired Agas fairly cheaply, as so many people are ripping them out. But then you've got to find a good installer - which could be a nightmare.

We had our kitchen refurbished last year, which included excavating the floor to a depth of about a foot. We discovered that our Aga was perched on an assortment of hard core, including at least two granite mushroom tops!

I'd love to have a aga but I rent so I just live vicariously through threads like this one which may help you too .
https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/housekeeping/5187196-all-things-aga-related

Have def seen some on eBay etc for fairly cheap. They don’t seem to hold value at all which is a pity. We are just at the end of a long and expensive renovation of an old listed cottage and the Aga was the dream purchase that we had to delay for seven years to pay for boring things like a roof and plumbing. . So suggesting to husband that we should now have an oil fired Aga installed and redo what we’ve done may have pushed him over the edge 🤣. Fortunately he did agree to an electric Aga after many months of me sighing and putting pictures of them in front of his face.

we are getting ours from Blake and Bull, rather than Aga themselves , they seem to know everything there is to know about Agas so I’m hoping we are in safe hands

I have a 40 year old oil fired Aga. It costs about 2 quid a day to run as I bought the oil in the summer through a local group.

I love it. I wouldn't be without it. I'm quite a good cook and I love the responsiveness of it, you so need to understand the basics though, so I'd recommend reading Sarah Whittaker's Facebook page "I love my Aga" it will explain a lot. Also Mary Berry's Aga cookbooks are useful.

It heats a good portion of our draughty farmhouse, meaning we don't have the heating on much, dries our clothes, keeps the kettle on warm, all whilst slow cooking something awesome. As you can tell, I love it

I had an old electric Aga in my last house and it wasn't as good as this oil one. It really is good, and hold its temperature very well.

Friends who have oil fired Agas buy their oil via local co operative groups in summer , when it’s cheaper . They also service their own oil fired Aga , there are pages out there with instructions that will also sell any spare parts necessary, but it’s mostly about cleaning the old carbon out.

We have a gas fired aga, goes on October to April but we have no tumble drier , central heating doesn’t go on much and as we have an old house it keeps it warm and dry , the gentle constant heat stops damp , condensation. The Aga was there when we moved in and is 50 years old at least . We would never have been able to afford to put it in ourselves but love it as we have it and the cost of running is not excessive for the comfort it gives us and the animals !

We get power cuts , but at least we stay warm even when electricity is out. We have updated the vermiculite and insulation on top to make it as effeicient as possible and it is serviced every year . Food tastes great cooked in it and it is always sad in Spring when it’s switched off and we go back to conventional cooking.

More great advice and info! Thank you, everyone.