How to Install a Wood Stove in a Mobile Home

You want to install a wood stove in your mobile home? Here’s how you can do it:

Quick answer: To install a wood stove in a mobile home, get a mobile home-approved wood stove model. Then, drill a hole through the roof where you insert a double-layered pipe or a firebox. Then, connect the pipe to your wood stove and mount the stove’s feet to the floor.

Optionally, add tiles to the walls surrounding your wood stove.

How to install a wood stove in your mobile home

Here are the steps:

Requirements: Get a mobile home-approved wood stove

Before you buy a wood stove for your mobile home, ensure it is mobile home approved. Now, the likelihood of something ever happening, even when you install a non-approved wood stove in your mobile home, is small.

However, just in case, and for insurance reasons, I highly suggest getting a mobile home-approved stove.

My philosophy with this is that having an approved stove might cost you a few bucks more. Or it takes you a little more time to find one. However, not having an approved stove can cost you your existence in case your mobile home ever catches fire.

In case neighboring buildings or a forest nearby catch fire, it gets even worse. The risk-to-benefit ratio leans totally toward getting a proper stove before you start.

Trust me.

A list of approved wood stoves is available from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). Here’s a summary:

Decide the location of the wood stove

After choosing and getting the right wood stove model, the next step to take is picking the right location in your mobile home.

A wood stove generally needs >3 inches of space from your mobile home’s walls. That’s the first consideration.

So, pick a spacious location. Preferably a corner of your mobile home dedicated to your wood stove.

After you know where the wood stove is being placed, you should determine the exact location of where the wood stove pipe goes through the roof (or wall).

If your wood stove pipe goes through the roof, then you can determine the location where the pipe passes by hanging a weighted string from the roof. 

You can add weight to a string by tying a nut, a screw, or something similar to it.

The string hanging straight down (thanks to gravity) tells you exactly where you should drill through in the doof. You just have to make sure that the lower-hanging weighted end of the string marks the wood stove’s pipe opening.

If the location in the roof has any structurally important parts such as studs or cables, then you should consider moving the entire stove a few inches to the side, where there’s no barrier in the roof.

Mark the spot you drill through in the roof.

Optional: Add tiles to the walls surrounding the wood stove

To protect your mobile home’s walls against heat coming from the wood stove, you can add tiles.

It looks nice and the tiles will absorb some of the heat.

This will, however, incur some extra costs.

But it’s usually not necessary as long as you have a mobile home-approved wood stove. These usually radiate very little heat from their backside.

So, protecting your walls with tiles is optional.

Install the chimney

Now that you’ve got your wood stove prepared, and you marked the pipe location in your mobile home’s roof, you can start the cutting!

Install your mobile home-approved wood stove’s pipe by cutting a hole in the ceiling. Additionally, most stoves come with a firebox which is inserted in the roof opening for fire protection which you will have to install. The hole you are cutting should match the dimensions of the firebox kit that is included with the wood stove.

If your wood stove comes without such a firebox, then I recommend either buying one or at least taking careful precautions to ensure your pipe won’t start a fire. For example, you can use a double-walled pipe from a hardware store for the pipe section passing through the roof.

This is almost as good!

For cutting, you can use a drywall saw or an electric wood saw. Both work the same. However, the drywall saw will be a little less messy.

After preparing the chimney hole, you will have to insert the wood stove’s pipe. Be cautious about inserting the pipe with the right side up!

Here’s a quote I found below a YouTube video:

“Be careful about inserting the stove pipe going upward, into the next section. That way, creosote leaks backward thru the joint, and drips into your home. Always install a stove pipe inserting the top section into the lower section. That way the creosote will drip back into the inside of the pipe, and be self-contained.”

Install the wood stove and connect pipes

The hardest part is done.

To install a wood stove in a mobile home, you will have to connect the stove’s pipe opening to the opening in your room. 

If you set up the roof opening with accuracy, then installing the wood stove is a simple plugging of the pipe.

If necessary, you can tighten the pipe with a pipe-tightening ring. However, I’d recommend doing this only if the pipes connect very loosely.

If your mobile home wood stove’s pipe connects tightly and securely,  you won’t need additional tightening.

The heat coming from the wood stove will soon further improve the pipe joints.

Mount the stove to the floor

If you move your mobile home around a lot, then you should mount the stove’s feet to your mobile home’s floor.

This can be as simple as mounting a few screws. If your wood stove does not have openings or handles for such mounts, then you can build your own mounting construction.

I’d recommend something like a metal piece that’s bent over the wood stove’s feet and screwed into the floor. Or you can build a more elaborate wood construction that stops the stove from moving around in your mobile home.

It all depends on your design preferences and how secure you want it to be.

Cost of installing a mobile home wood stove

On average, a mobile home wood stove kit will cost you $1,200. Oftentimes, this includes the pipe. For the pipe, you should calculate an extra $100. So, you can expect to pay around $1,300 for your mobile home wood stove.

If you hire someone to install it for you, you can assume an additional $500 on top of that.

However, most mobile homeowners don’t hire anyone and prefer to do their own installations.

You can get wood stove pipes from all regular hardware stores. There are no specific requirements that wood stove pipes must fulfill in your mobile home. It can be a regular wood stove pipe.

Will your mobile home insurance rate increase after installing a wood stove?

It can be that your insurance will increase your insurance rate slightly after you install your mobile home wood stove.

However, the rate increase is usually insignificant. And also, heating with wood usually pays for itself quickly, since it is the most cost-effective way of heating.