fireplaces

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  • Phillip Allen
    new member
    • May 2002
    • 63618

    fireplaces

    any you guys seen this? Looks like I've got some reading to do before I start my daughter's fireplace in her new home...

    The doctrine of nonresistance against arbitrary power, and oppression, is absurd, slavish, and destructive of the good and happiness of mankind.
    Personal failures are too important to be trusted to others.
  • huisjen
    innocent widdle bunny
    • Jun 2001
    • 8689

    #2
    Fireplaces are ornaments. They're one step up from just having a smoke hole in the roof. Woodstoves are the way to go for wood heat. If you want to watch the flames, get a fireplace insert with glass doors.

    I'm surprised this is news to you Phillip.

    Dan
    Master of The Ensign's Gig: a 7 1/2 foot flat bottom plywood skiff,
    and Prudence: Lightning #7896.

    Think Good Thoughts.
    Thoughts become words.
    Words become actions.
    Actions become habits.
    Habits become character.
    Character becomes destiny.

    Comment

    • Peter Kalshoven
      Senior Member #20
      • Apr 1999
      • 1033

      #3
      John Gulland is one of the guru's in my industry, I've known him for 15 years and he really understands how a fireplace works.
      Having said that, a masonry fireplace MAY help with heat in a home, but you have to run it ALL the time. The idea with fireplaces in old homes was that the central location of the chimney and the thermal mass of the stone or brick helped radiate heat that would otherwise be lost up the flue. However, you are still going to loose a lot of heat up the pipe.
      Best solution for a new home is an EPA rated fireplace, which most manufacturers make. These products are basically big wood stoves that are designed to be built into the wall, and that are truly efficient like a woodstove, without taking up space in the room.
      This is what I would do if I was looking for heat from a fireplace.
      Pete
      "I'm built for comfort, ain't built for speed." - Willie Dixon

      "I refuse to grow up, as I believe that it’s not mandatory." - Chuck "Paladin" Phillips

      “Telecaster: Most basic kick-ass electric guitar ever made. (I should place IMHO right about here, but it's a natural and universal truth.)” -Tweed's Blues

      "The truth of the matter is that I like my whiskey straight, my coffee black, my beer dark and my women feisty." -J. Madison

      Comment

      • Mrleft8
        Banned
        • Feb 2000
        • 31864

        #4
        A properly designed and built fireplace is not merely decorative Dan. While it'll probably never be as efficient as a good airtight stove, it can produce reflective heat, as well as thermal mass.

        Comment

        • Fitz
          Wood Canoe Nut
          • Mar 2001
          • 2822

          #5
          Fireplace

          We had an 1945 vintage chimney tacked on to our 300 year old house. It pretty much lacked a footing of any kind and was tipping over and pulling the house down with it. We tore it down and rebuilt.

          The result was a pumice lined flue and vermiculite insulated chimney with a modified Rumford style firebox. It throws a lot of heat, but also sucks a lot of air (heat). We have no trouble at all with smoke or backdrafts. It draws really well.

          The finished fireplace made the cover of This Old House:

          "Wherever there is a channel for water, there is a road for the canoe. " - Thoreau

          Comment

          • Phillip Allen
            new member
            • May 2002
            • 63618

            #6
            some are missing the point of the fireplace...it is a social center in our house and was all my life. A place to back up your fanny or sit and crack nuts and toss the hulls into the coals. It's a grand entrance with Dad and an armload of snow encrusted wood. It is a place for the kids to throw down their quilts in front of and tell stories and have slumber parties. A fireplace is art in the heart; a point of light in the dark of night.

            An efficent wood stove is to warming the house as WAl Mart is to covering your butt...cheaply

            My daughter has/had a mason for a father, grand father and great grandfather and her brothers are masons...OF COURSE she wants a fireplace in her new home!
            The doctrine of nonresistance against arbitrary power, and oppression, is absurd, slavish, and destructive of the good and happiness of mankind.
            Personal failures are too important to be trusted to others.

            Comment

            • Mrleft8
              Banned
              • Feb 2000
              • 31864

              #7
              No better place on a snowy evening, than sitting in front of the fire, roasting chestnuts, sharing a few drinks and stew or soup and good bread with friends and family... One of my favorite memories as a child is coming in encased in snow and ice from a day of sledding, Mom setting a tray of cinnamon toast triangles and a steaming cup of cocoa, or milky sweet tea.... The fire would chase the shivers out of your body, and just about the time the cocoa or tea was gone your eyes get very heavy, and everything is comfortable and warm... You wake up an hour or so later to the aroma of beef stew, or vegetable soup..... Still snowing out.... Maybe no school tomorrow....

              Comment

              • huisjen
                innocent widdle bunny
                • Jun 2001
                • 8689

                #8
                My childhood was different. We'd get to The Farm on Friday night. This was the place that Dad was slowly overhauling, having bought it as a weekend place just before it became too bad to save. Dad would pick us up from Mom's house and take us there. The neighbor who pastured his cows in our field also plowed our driveway in winter. We'd shovel the steps as best we could and carry our weekend bags in. Dad would go turn on the water system, light the water heater, and start a fire in the furnace while we, his kids, got some quicker heat going in the living room wood stove.

                It wasn't very big. It's the sort known as a laundry stove, but it threw heat quickly. You could set wet mittens on the brick surround behind it to dry. It warmed that room, and the heat would spread some into the kitchen and dinning room. It was cosy. And you could still dump in your nut shells, Christmas wrapping paper, hair combed off the cat, or whatever else offended you into it. It didn't spit live embers either.

                I've yet to see a fireplace that could warm a room. They draw too much and just spit your heat out the chimney. Maybe in theory they could work, but I've never seen it happen yet.

                Fitz, with all due respect and warmest regards, appearing in This Old House increases my suspicion. That magazine is sort of like Martha Stewart for men: fancy, but doesn't seem to really know what it's talking about beyond the salesman's pitch.

                Phillip, I've read commentary from 200 years ago on how the fireplace will never be supplanted by the kitchen range woodstove for social reasons. I disagree, but do what you gotta do.

                Dan
                Master of The Ensign's Gig: a 7 1/2 foot flat bottom plywood skiff,
                and Prudence: Lightning #7896.

                Think Good Thoughts.
                Thoughts become words.
                Words become actions.
                Actions become habits.
                Habits become character.
                Character becomes destiny.

                Comment

                • Sailor
                  Senior Member #4610
                  • Feb 2002
                  • 5229

                  #9
                  OK everyone, I'm back. Sort of. I have been missing from WB forum now for about 6 months. I had a fire in my house starting from the fire place. The fire fighters figured it was either a cracked brick in the fire box or mortar that fell out. The chimney was cleaned recently ( Maybe had 20 or 30 fires in it since it was cleaned) and there was no buildup inside the chimney. Bad luck on my part really. It had been inspected and should have been ready to go, the inspector could not have seen up the chimney to where the fire started (chest high on a 4x4 header between the room and the flu) Whe asked by the insurance ppl, I made no secret of the fact that I wanted it replaced (as it was). My favorite place to be in my house is in front of a cozy warm fire. Carcking nuts, carrying armloads of wood, playing in the fire ( I can do that now that it's my house and my mother isn't there to tell me not to ) I love to read on a cold winter night before the fire, poking at it as it dies and adding logs fresh from outside to hear the hiss and crackle...... Man I miss that.
                  Anyway, I had the insurance company rebuild it. Now the original, as you may be able to see in my avatar (sp?) is a stone faced brick fire place. the chimney was brick as well, outside the house. I had a bricklayer come in and he "rebuilt" the chimney from the ground up. The whole thing came down from the top to the foundation. Once that was done, he bolted a steel angle to the side of the foundation to widen the chimney. There are windows on the second floor near where the chimney is so to widen the whole fire box required widening only one side of the structure. On top of this angle bracket, he put a steel plate then built the structure on top of this. There's an outdoor air inlet, an ash chute, and a metal heatilator (sp?) which will eventually have doors to close it. I wanted fans to blow the heat around and doors to help keep some of the heat from rising out the flu. I understand that building he chimney into the center of the house is more efficient. but as a rebuilt that was not possible. The fire place inside the house was damaged by the fire fighters. There were 2 slate columns as part of the decoration of the fire place. The Fire fighters broke one of them in the process of putting out the fire. I have managed to salvage many of the original parts to the fire place. I am however one column short. The columns are about 4 inches in diameter and just over 3 feet long. I will need to replace them and can't seem to find anyone who turns stone anymore. I painted the living room red in order to get a contrast between the black stone and the red walls. What a great effect. It really "popped". Now I have to find a new stone fire place that is black. With nobody locally who turns stone, I was hoping one of you may be able to help me out. I can provide one of the original columns, photos thereof, measurements, descriptions etc if anyone knows of an artist who turns stone. My mother suggested a large city with a sizeable italian district that may have stone artists. I have yet to find one. Anyone from Montreal know of any stone masons who TURN stone?
                  The original fire place parts are kept in my basement now until I can come up with a new design for the fire place that uses as much of the original as possible.
                  In keeping with the original theme of this thread, I would never have a house without a fire place, it's just too much of a social/relaxation aspect of my life to live without, risk of fire or no. I agree that an efficient means of burning is desireable and as such will have glass doors on the fire box. I do see it as an architectural/decorative aspect of the room and am therefore waiting to install the fireplace till I can have it done the way I want it done.
                  Can anyone help me out with a stone mason?
                  Phillip I think you're absolutely correct in installing a fire place, there will be many fond memories created there.
                  If one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours.
                  -Henry David Thoreau-

                  Comment

                  • Phillip Allen
                    new member
                    • May 2002
                    • 63618

                    #10
                    I don't know anyone who "turns" stone but am interested in the thought...send a pic or two if you want...PM me and I'll send an email address and the like...
                    The doctrine of nonresistance against arbitrary power, and oppression, is absurd, slavish, and destructive of the good and happiness of mankind.
                    Personal failures are too important to be trusted to others.

                    Comment

                    • Nicholas Carey
                      Flâneur • Seattle
                      • Feb 2001
                      • 20312

                      #11
                      Efficient fireplaces were perfected c. 1795 -- when the efficiency of a fireplace mattered -- by Sir Benjamin Thompson, Count Rumford.


                      Cruise over to Superior Clay and order yourself a Rumford Fireplace kit (or just read about the whys/wherefores of the design). Here's a Rumford (left) vs. a "modern" fireplace:



                      This is the plan for a 48-inch Rumford fireplace. Note the shallowness of the firebox (just 1' 4"), the flat back wall of the firebox and the curved throat:

                      Last edited by Nicholas Carey; 07-20-2007, 03:35 PM.
                      “The big joke on democracy is that it gives its mortal enemies the tools to its own destruction,” Goebbels said as the Nazis rose to power—one of those quotes that sound apocryphal but are not.​
                      — Adam Gopnik

                      Comment

                      • Stiletto
                        Grant S
                        • Jan 2003
                        • 11234

                        #12
                        Some urban authorities here ban open fireplaces and other inefficient burners because collectively they create a lot of smog, most notably in areas that get frosty weather conditions that cause thermal inversions that prevent the smoke from getting away.
                        There is nothing quite as permanent as a good temporary repair.

                        Comment

                        • Phillip Allen
                          new member
                          • May 2002
                          • 63618

                          #13
                          Originally posted by Stiletto
                          Some urban authorities here ban open fireplaces and other inefficient burners because collectively they create a lot of smog, most notably in areas that get frosty weather conditions that cause thermal inversions that prevent the smoke from getting away.
                          it's hard to COLLECT taxes on hand gathered wood but much easier to control the utility companies...
                          The doctrine of nonresistance against arbitrary power, and oppression, is absurd, slavish, and destructive of the good and happiness of mankind.
                          Personal failures are too important to be trusted to others.

                          Comment

                          • Ian McColgin
                            Senior Member
                            • Apr 1999
                            • 51638

                            #14
                            Multi-downdraft masonry installations - a few tons of stuff - do not have to be run all the time and are very efficient. One I helped build twenty years ago in Harwich swallows a couple of four footers in the morning and a couple more in the afternoon. It burns hot to a dry ash, stores lots of BTUs, and works. They are very common in Holland and some other places.

                            Comment

                            • Nicholas Carey
                              Flâneur • Seattle
                              • Feb 2001
                              • 20312

                              #15
                              Originally posted by Stiletto
                              Some urban authorities here ban open fireplaces and other inefficient burners because collectively they create a lot of smog, most notably in areas that get frosty weather conditions that cause thermal inversions that prevent the smoke from getting away.
                              Superior Clay's Rumsford fireplaces are certified clean by Washington State's Dept of Ecology -- they can be operated when a level 1 burn ban is in force.

                              Washington law defined "clean" as not more than 7.3 grams of particulate matter less than 10 microns in diameter per kilogram of fuel burned. The Rumford fireplaces tested averaged about 4 grams per kilogram.
                              “The big joke on democracy is that it gives its mortal enemies the tools to its own destruction,” Goebbels said as the Nazis rose to power—one of those quotes that sound apocryphal but are not.​
                              — Adam Gopnik

                              Comment

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