Tlie Principles of Ventilation, 



223 



Open grates of the Franklin or Galton style are excellent as venti- 

 lators and economical in the use of coal. The most modern of this 

 kind of grate is that manufactured by the Open Stove Ventilating 

 Company of New York. These grates have a hollow back and hollow 

 sides, through which cold air, brought by a special flue from outside, 

 circulates and escapes into the room, heated through radial openings 

 in the top, just over the arch of the fire-place. The current of heated 

 air enters the room, having an upward and outward direction, and after 

 describing a series of loops which include all parts of the room, sweeps 

 back and into the fire, supporting combustion, and finally escaping 

 through the chimney. This is evidently a combination of direct and 

 indirect heating. The direct radiation being the same as with the 

 simple open grate, while the hot air poured in the room represents an 

 amount of heat saved, which in the case of the simple grate passes up 

 the chimney, doing no useful work. I have not seen this apparatus in 

 operation, but several scientific men have examined it, and report that 

 its real performance is close to what the theory of its construction 

 calls for. 



A stove and grate combined, called the Ideal/' has lately been placed 

 on the market in this city by the Magee Furnace Company of Boston, 

 of which I am able to speak from experience, having one in use at my 

 house. When used as a stove, the Ideal" is simply a very cheerful 

 looking base-burning stove, neither better nor worse than other stoves 

 as regards ventilation. When converted into an open grate, however, 

 Avhich is done by removing the front, thus exposing a bed of live coal, 

 it acts as a vigorous exhauster. It is better than the simple grate, be- 

 cause it continues to radiate and conduct on all sides like any other 

 stove, while removing air from the room as rapidly as the simple grate. 

 On one occasion, by way of experiment, the room was filled with 

 smoke, and the change made from stove to grate, when immediately 

 the smoke in the air was observed to stratify, so to speak, and rapidly 

 disappeared, passing into the fire in long filaments. The temperature 

 of the room, it must be added, falls rapidly after the change is made — 

 in the case mentioned, falling from 80^ to 73° in about half an hour. 



A combinational system of direct and indirect heating with ventila- 

 tion is to heat air by steam-pipes in the basement, and convey it to 

 some central locality on each floor, and then by a small, simple grate 

 fire in each room, draw out the heated air and pass it up the chimney. 



An example of such a system, slightly modified, is afforded in a resi- 

 dence designed and built by the architect, A. W. Fuller, of this city, 

 for Mr. Geo. W. Van Slyke, and of which the following is a description. 

 The main hall is 16x'^'-i feet, and has direct communication with all 

 rooms of first story, and, by a large well-hole, with the second story. 



