I understand that with a traditional fireplace, most of the heat is lost through the chimney and you have to be very close to it to feel much heat. A wood stove or insert performs much better. However, I’m curious how people stayed warm enough in a house. It would seem that everywhere besides being near the fireplace would be freezing. I guess fireplaces were mostly meant to locally heat people near the fireplace, and not so much that the fireplace is a central heat source. That would explain why people often had a fireplace in every room. Just light the fireplace that you will be near for most of the time, etc. rather than heat the whole house. Just curious since you often hear “warm by the fireplace”.
In: Technology
The inefficiency doesn’t much affect the temperature of the house, but all the effort behind keeping it hot for a whole winter. Having an inefficient heating method meant that a good part of fall was spent buying/gathering wood, drying it, cutting it, storing it. People lost days and days of work (or money to pay others to do it for them) because the inefficiency meant you burned three or four logs a day and had to have enough for the whole winter.
This opposed to being hooked up to a gas line or some sort of kerosene burners that needed refills once a year, because efficiency meant they didn’t burn as much material to keep the same temperature
Latest Answers