My house had a nice glass fronted fireplace when we bought it. We burned it for a couple of winters and it was pretty efficient because it has two outward facing blowers in the stone work on the sides. A good friend of mine had somehow taken possession of this Lopi stove. He never installed it in his house because his wife has dust allergies and they were worried how she would react to smoke and ash. He left outside behind his shop for a couple of years and forgot about it. So one day I stopped by his shop to pick up a couple dozen tomato plants and I spy the rusted up stove laying in grass. He told me he had no use for it and I could have it if I wanted it. About a week later he showed up at my house with the stove on a landscape trailer. It had some broken and missing firebrick and was missing a door hinge pin but otherwise it was all there. I wirebrushed and sanded the hell out it and gave it a new coat of paint. Make that several coats of paint. I bought firebrick at Tractor Supply and cut it to fit. I called the nearest Lopi dealer and he had a pair of hinges in stock. I also had him order new piece of door glass to dress it up a bit. So I had a stove. Now for the install. I'm a pretty handy guy but I'm smart enough to know when to call a pro. I had never done chimney work or lining before and I studied it a bit and I'm sure I could've done it but with time constraints and no first hand knowledge I called a local, well-reputed chimney man. I'm glad I did. I learned a lot. Unfortunately, didn't take any "before" pictures. I left the brass fireplace trim in place and after these pictures were taken I ordered a surround trim for the stove. It's nice that you can still see the brass around the surround trim. I'll post a picture of that later when I get home.
