A chiminea or a fire basket/log burner?

[miljee]

For the patio? Anyone have any opinions? I guess the fire basket will be nicer to look at with a fire in it but it will also be messier! I don't intend BBQ'ing on a fire basket, incidentally, so that's not a consideration

Personally i fancy a fire basket - a chimenea seems a bit, well, tacky to me.

But why's it messier?

And how do you start the fire? Do you use firestarter blocky things? I have enough problems with the coal fire in the front room...

I like chimneas...but the iron ones, not the terracotta.

I was wondering about getting something like this too but wondered if the kids were more likely to keep away from a chimnea as its taller and easier to see. So might be the safer option than a fire basket which is lower to the ground and easily trippable over.

I settled on one from www.greenfingers.com It's the square one that comes up 1st when you go to 'Fireboxes, Chimenias etc' ie square with a grill on top. We don't intend BBQ'ing on it, though! The reason I say more messy is because ash and cinders can fall out of the (mesh) bottom, hence the tray underneath.

As for lighting a fire in it (bearing in mind it hasn't been delivered yet!) I imagine you'd do it using a) scrunched up newspaper/ cardboard, b) twigs as kindling on top of that then, once they'd caught (use a gas 'clicker' to light the paper in several places), c) bigger pieces of wood and so on, til you were able to put logs on. I have many years experience of lighting my mother's grate in her home! The trick is getting a good draught going which mum's house is well designed to provide ie plenty of underfloor ventilation. It was built before central heating so the grate was THE means of heating the house! If it were a bit 'blowy' outdoors with my fire box, I imagine, I'd use some cardboard to act as a wind shield to protect the baby flames til they'd caught.

We have a firebasket and I do love it, however it's very hard to clear away the cinders and should you have a very windy day before you can clean up, you will find cinders blowing around the garden. Not good when you've just hung the washing out

Aha! Good thinking! What about- JUST a thought, a cover for the whole thing like those plastic stacking garden chairs covers you can get on ebay- assuming you remember to stick it on AFTER it's cooled down but when you don't have time or the inclination to clean it of an evening? Would that work?

I guess it would. We tend to have fires very late at night/early in the morning so never awake for it to cool down