THE CONSTRUCTION AND CARE OF STOVES FURNACES AND CHIMNEYS



V.
THE CONSTRUCTION AND CARE OF STOVES, FURNACES, AND CHIMNEYS.


If all American housekeepers could be taught how to select and manage
the most economical and convenient apparatus for cooking and for warming
a house, many millions now wasted by ignorance and neglect would be
saved. Every woman should be taught the scientific principles in regard
to heat, and then their application to practical purposes, for her own
benefit, and also to enable her to train her children and servants in
this important duty of home life on which health and comfort so much
depend.

The laws that regulate the generation, diffusion, and preservation of
heat as yet are a sealed mystery to thousands of young women who imagine
they are completing a suitable education in courses of instruction
from which most that is practical in future domestic life is wholly
excluded. We therefore give a brief outline of some of the leading
scientific principles which every housekeeper should understand and
employ, in order to perform successfully one of her most important
duties.

Concerning the essential nature of heat, and its intimate relations
with the other great natural forces, light, electricity, etc., we shall
not attempt to treat, but shall, for practical purposes, assume it to
be a separate and independent force. Heat or caloric, then, has certain
powers or principles. Let us consider them:

First, we find _Conduction_, by which heat passes from one particle
to another next to it; as when one end of a poker is warmed by placing
the other end in the fire. The bodies which allow this power free
course are called conductors, and those which do not are named
non-conductors, Metals are good conductors; feathers, wool, and furs
are poor conductors; and water, air, and gases are non-conductors.

Another principle of heat is _Convection_, by which water, air, and
gases are warmed. This is, literally, the process of _conveying_ heat
from one portion of a fluid body to another by currents resulting from
changes of temperature. It is secured by bringing one portion of a
liquid or gas into contact with a heated surface, whereby it becomes
lighter and expanded in volume. In consequence, the cooler and heavier
particles above pressing downward, the lighter ones rise upward, when
the former, being heated, rise in their turn, and give place to others
again descending from above. Thus a constant motion of currents and
interchange of particles is produced until, as in a vessel of water, the
whole body comes to an equal temperature. Air is heated in the same way.
In case of a hot stove, the air that touches it is heated, becomes
lighter, and rises, giving place to cooler and heavier particles, which,
when heated, also ascend. It is owing to this process that the air of a
room is warmest at the top and coolest at the bottom. It is owing to
this principle, also, that water and air can not be heated by fire from
above. For the particles of these bodies, being non-conductors, do not
impart heat to each other; and when the warmest are at the top, they can
not take the place of cooler and heavier ones below.

Another principle of heat (which it shares with light) is _Radiation_,
by which all things send out heat to surrounding cooler bodies. Some
bodies will absorb radiated heat, others will reflect it, and others
allow it to pass through them without either absorbing or reflecting
Thus, black and rough substances absorb heat, (or light,) colored and
smooth articles reflect it, while air allows it to pass through without
either absorbing or reflecting. It is owing to this, that rough and
black vessels boil water sooner than smooth and light-colored ones.

Another principle is _Reflection_, by which heat radiated to a
surface is turned back from it when not absorbed or allowed to pass
through; just as a ball rebounds from a wall; just as sound is thrown
back from a hill, making echo; just as rays of light are reflected
from a mirror. And, as with light, the rays of heat are always reflected
from a surface in an angle exactly corresponding to the direction in
which it strikes that surface. Thus, if heated are comes to an object
perpendicularly--that is, at right angles, it will be reflected back
in the same line. If it strikes obliquely, it is reflected obliquely,
at an angle with the surface precisely the same as the angle with which
it first struck. And, of course, if it moves toward the surface and
comes upon it in a line having so small an angle with it as to be
almost parallel with it, the heated air is spread wide and diffused
through a larger space than when the angles are greater and the width
of reflection less.

[Illustration: Fig. 31.]
[Illustration: Fig. 32.]
[Illustration: Fig. 33.]

The simplest mode of warming a house and cooking food is by radiated
heat from fires; but this is the most wasteful method, as respects
time, labor, and expense. The most convenient, economical, and
labor-saving mode of employing heat is by convection, as applied in
stoves and furnaces. But for want of proper care and scientific
knowledge this method has proved very destructive to health. When
warming and cooking were done by open fires, houses were well supplied
with pure air, as is rarely the case in rooms heated by stoves. For
such is the prevailing ignorance on this subject that, as long as
stoves save labor and warm the air, the great majority of people,
especially among the poor, will use them in ways that involve
debilitated constitutions and frequent disease.

The most common modes of cooking, where open fires are relinquished,
are by the range and the cooking-stove. The range is inferior to the
stove in these respects: it is less economical, demanding much more
fuel; it endangers the dress of the cook while standing near for various
operations; it requires more stooping than the stove while cooking;
it will not keep a fire all night, as do the best stoves; it will not
burn wood and coal equally well; and lastly, if it warms the kitchen
sufficiently in winter, it is too warm for summer. Some prefer it
because the fumes of cooking can be carried off; but stoves properly
arranged accomplish this equally well.

After extensive inquiry and many personal experiments, the author has
found a cooking-stove constructed on true scientific principles, which
unites convenience, comfort, and economy in a remarkable manner. Of
this stove, drawings and descriptions will now be given, as the best
mode of illustrating the practical applications of these principles
to the art of cooking, and to show how much American women have suffered
and how much they have been imposed upon for want of proper knowledge
in this branch of their profession. And every woman can understand
what follows with much less effort than young girls at high-schools
give to the first problems of Geometry--for which they will never have
any practical use, while attention to this problem of home affairs
will cultivate the intellect quite as much as the abstract reasonings
of Algebra and Geometry.,

[Illustration: Fig. 34.]

Fig. 34 represents a portion of the interior of this cooking-stove.
First, notice the fire-box, which has corrugated (literally, wrinkled)
sides, by which space is economized, so that as much heating surface
is secured as if they were one third larger; as the heat radiates from
every part of the undulating surface, which is one third greater in
superficial extent than if it were plane. The shape of the fire-box
also secures more heat by having oblique sides--which radiate more
effectively into the oven beneath than if they were perpendicular, as
illustrated below--while also it is sunk into the oven, so as to radiate
from three instead of from two sides, as in most other stoves, the
front of whose fire-boxes with their grates are built so as to be the
front of the stove itself.

[Illustration: Fig 35. Model Stove]
[Illustration: Fig 36. Ordinary Stove]

The oven is the space under and around the back and front sides of the
fire-box. The oven-bottom is not introduced in the diagram, but it is
a horizontal plate between the fire-box and what is represented as the
"flue-plate," which separates the oven from the bottom of the stove.
The top of the oven is the horizontal corrugated plate passing from
the rear edge of the fire-box to the back flues. These are three in
number--the back centre-flue, which is closed to the heat and smoke
coming over the oven from the fire-box by a damper--and the two back
corner-flues. Down these two corner-flues passes the current of hot
air and smoke, having first drawn across the corrugated oven-top. The
arrows show its descent through these flues, from which it obliquely
strikes and passes over the flue-plate, then under it, and then out
through the centre back-flue, which is open at the bottom, up into the
smoke-pipe.

The flue-plate is placed obliquely, to accumulate heat by forcing and
compression; for the back space where the smoke enters from the
corner-flues is largest, and decreases toward the front, so that the
hot current is compressed in a narrow space, between the oven-bottom
and the flue-plate at the place where the bent arrows are seen. Here
again it enters a wider space, under the flue-plate, and proceeds to
another narrow one, between the flue-plate and the bottom of the stove,
and thus is compressed and retained longer than if not impeded by these
various contrivances. The heat and smoke also strike the plate
obliquely, and thus, by reflection from its surface, impart more heat
than if the passage was a horizontal one.

The external radiation is regulated by the use of nonconducting plaster
applied to the flue-plate and to the sides of the corner-flues, so
that the heat is prevented from radiating in any direction except
toward the oven. The doors, sides, and bottom of the stove are lined
with tin casings, which hold a stratum of air, also a non-conductor.
These are so arranged as to be removed whenever the weather becomes
cold, so that the heat may then radiate into the kitchen. The outer
edges of the oven are also similarly protected from loss of heat by
tin casings and air-spaces, and the oven-doors opening at the front
of the store are provided with the same economical savers of heat.
High tin covers placed on the top prevent the heat from radiating above
the stove. These are exceedingly useful, as the space under them is
well heated and arranged for baking, for heating irons, and many other
incidental necessities. Cake and pies can be baked on the top, while
the oven is used for bread or for meats. When all the casings and
covers are on, almost all the heat is confined within the stove, and
whenever heat for the room is wanted, opening the front oven-doors
turns it out into the kitchen.

Another contrivance is that of ventilating-holes in the front doors,
through which fresh air is brought into the oven. This secures several
purposes: it carries off the fumes of cooking meats, and prevents the
mixing of flavors when different articles are cooked in the oven; it
drives the heat that accumulates between the fire-box and front doors
down around the oven, and equalizes its heat, so that articles need
not be moved while baking; and lastly, as the air passes through the
holes of the fire-box, it causes the burning of gases in the smoke,
and thus increases heat. When wood or bituminous coal is used,
perforated metal linings are put in the fire-box, and the result is
the burning of smoke and gases that otherwise would pass into the
chimney. This is a great discovery in the economy of fuel, which can
be applied in many ways.

Heretofore, most cooking-stoves have had dumping-grates, which are
inconvenient from the dust produced, are uneconomical in the use of
fuel, and disadvantageous from too many or too loose joints. But
recently this stove has been provided with a dumping-grate which
also will sift ashes, and can be cleaned without dust and the other
objectionable features of dumping-grates. A further account of this
stove, and the mode of purchasing and using it, will be given at the
close of the book.

Those who are taught to manage the stove properly keep the fire going
all night, and equally well with wood or coal, thus saving the expense
of kindling and the trouble of starting a new fire. When the fuel is
of good quality, all that is needed in the morning is to draw the
back-damper, snake the grate, and add more fuel.

Another remarkable feature of this store is the extension-top, on which
is placed a water reservoir, constantly heated by the smoke as it
passes from the stove, through one or two uniting passages, to the
smoke-pipe. Under this is placed a closet for warming and keeping hot
the dishes, vegetables, meats, etc., while preparing for dinner. It
is also very useful in drying fruit; and when large baking is required,
a small appended pot for charcoal turns it into a fine large oven,
that bakes as nicely as a brick oven.

Another useful appendage is a common tin oven, in which roasting can
be done in front of the stove, the oven-doors being removed for the
purpose. The roast will be done as perfectly as by an open fire.

This stove is furnished with pipes for heating water, like the
water-back of ranges, and these can be taken or left out at pleasure.
So also the top covers, the baking-stool and pot, and the summer-back,
bottom, and side-casings can be used or omitted as preferred.

[Illustration Fig 37]

Fig. 37 exhibits the stove completed, with all its appendages, as they
might be employed in cooking for a large number.

Its capacity, convenience, and economy as a stove may be estimated by
the following fact: With proper management of dampers, one
ordinary-sized coal-hod of anthracite coal will, for twenty-four hours,
keep the stove running, keep seventeen gallons of water hot at all
hours, bake pies and puddings in the warm closet, heat flat-irons under
the back cover, boil tea-kettle and one pot under the front cover,
bake bread in the oven, and cook a turkey in the tin roaster in front.
The author has numerous friends, who, after trying the best ranges,
have dismissed them for this stove, and in two or three years cleared
the whole expense by the saving of fuel.

The remarkable durability of this stove is another economic feature.
For in addition to its fine castings and nice-fitting workmanship, all
the parts liable to burn out are so protected by linings, and other
contrivances easily renewed, that the stove itself may pass from one
generation to another, as do ordinary chimneys. The writer has visited
in families where this stove had been in constant use for eighteen and
twenty years, and was still as good as new. In most other families the
stoves are broken, burnt-out, or thrown aside for improved patterns
every four, five, or six years, and sometimes, to the knowledge of the
writer, still oftener.

Another excellent point is that, although it is so complicated in its
various contrivances as to demand intelligent management in order to
secure all its advantages, it also can be used satisfactorily even
when the mistress and maid are equally careless and ignorant of its
distinctive merits. To such it offers all the advantages of ordinary
good stoves, and is extensively used by those who take no pains to
understand and apply its peculiar advantages.

But the writer has managed the stove herself in all the details of
cooking, and is confident that any housekeeper of common sense, who
is instructed properly, and who also aims to have her kitchen affairs
managed with strict economy, can easily train any servant who is willing
to learn, so as to gain the full advantages offered. And even without
any instructions at all, except the printed directions sent with the
stove, an intelligent woman can, by due attention, though not without,
both manage it, and teach her children and servants to do likewise.
And whenever this stove has failed to give the highest satisfaction,
it has been, either because the housekeeper was not apprized of its
peculiarities, or because she did not give sufficient attention to the
matter, or was not able or willing to superintend and direct its
management.

The consequence has been that, in families where this stove has been
understood and managed aright, it has saved nearly one half of the
fuel that would be used in ordinary stoves, constructed with the usual
disregard of scientific and economic laws. And it is because we know
this particular stove to be convenient, reliable, and economically
efficient beyond ordinary experience, in the important housekeeping
element of kitchen labor, that we devote to it so much space and pains
to describe its advantageous points.

CHIMNEYS.

One of the most serious evils in domestic life is often found in
chimneys that will not properly draw the smoke of a fire or stove.
Although chimneys have been building for a thousand years, the artisans
of the present day seem strangely ignorant of the true method of
constructing them so as always to carry smoke upward instead of
downward. It is rarely the case that a large house is built in which
there is not some flue or chimney which "will not draw." One of the
reasons why the stove described as excelling all others is sometimes
cast aside for a poorer one is, that it requires a properly constructed
chimney, and multitudes of women do not know how to secure it. The
writer in early life shed many a bitter tear, drawn forth by smoke
from an ill-constructed kitchen-chimney, and thousands all over the
land can report the same experience.

The following are some of the causes and the remedies for this evil.

The most common cause of poor chimney draughts is too large an opening
for the fireplace, either too wide or too high in front, or having too
large a throat for the smoke. In a lower story, the fireplace should
not be larger than thirty inches wide, twenty-five inches high, and
fifteen deep. In the story above, it should be eighteen inches square
and fifteen inches deep.

Another cause is too short a flue, and the remedy is to lengthen it.
As a general rule, the longer the flue the stronger the draught. But
in calculating the length of a flue, reference must be had to
side-flues, if any open into it. Where this is the case, the length
of the main flue is to be considered as extending only from the bottom
to the point where the upper flue joins it, and where the lower will
receive air from the upper flue. If a smoky flue can not be increased
in length, either by closing an upper flue or lengthening the chimney,
the fireplace must be contracted so that all the air near the fire
will be heated and thus pressed upward.

If a flue has more than one opening, in some cases it is impossible
to secure a good draught. Sometimes it will work well and sometimes
it will not. The only safe rule is to have a separate flue to each
fire.

Another cause of poor draughts is too tight a room, so that the cold
air from without can not enter to press the warm air up the chimney.
The remedy is to admit a small current of air from without.

Another cause is two chimneys in one room, or in rooms opening together,
in which the draught in one is much stronger than in the other. In
this case, the stronger draught will draw away from the weaker. The
remedy is, for each room to have a proper supply of outside air; or,
in a single room, to stop one of the chimneys.

Another cause is the too close vicinity of a hill or buildings higher
than the top of the chimney, and the remedy for this is to raise the
chimney.

Another cause is the descent, into unused fireplaces, of smoke from
other chimneys near. The remedy is to close the throat of the unused
chimney.

Another cause is a door opening toward the fireplace, on the same side
of the room, so that its draught passes along the wall and makes a
current that draws out the smoke. The remedy is to change the hanging
of the door so as to open another way.

Another cause is strong winds. The remedy is a turn-cap on top of the
chimney.

Another cause is the roughness of the inside of a chimney, or
projections which impede the passage of the smoke. Every chimney should
be built of equal dimensions from bottom to top, with no projections
into it, with as few bends as possible, and with the surface of the
inside as smooth as possible.

Another cause of poor draughts is openings into the chimney of chambers
for stove-pipes. The remedy is to close them, or insert stove-pipes
that are in use.

Another cause is the falling out of brick in some part of the chimney
so that outer air is admitted. The remedy is to close the opening.

The draught of a stove may be affected by most of these causes. It
also demands that the fireplace have a tight fire-board, or that the
throat he carefully filled. For neglecting this, many a good stove has
been thrown aside and a poor one taken in its place.

If all young women had committed to memory these causes of evil and
their remedies, many a badly-built chimney might have been cured, and
many smoke-drawn tears, sighs, ill-tempers, and irritating words
avoided.

But there are dangers in this direction which demand special attention.
Where one flue has two stoves or fireplaces, in rooms one above the
other, in certain states of the atmosphere, the lower room, being the
warmer, the colder air and carbonic acid in the room above will pass
down into the lower room through the opening for the stove or the
fireplace.

This occurred not long since in a boarding-school, when the gas in a
room above flowed into a lower one, and suffocated several to death.
This room had no mode of ventilation, and several persons slept in it,
and were thus stifled. Professor Brewer states a similar case in the
family of a relative. An anthracite stove was used in the upper room;
and on one still, close night, the gas from this stove descended through
the flue and the opening into a room below, and stifled two persons
to insensibility, though, by proper efforts, their lives were saved.
Many such cases have occurred where rooms have been thus filled with
poisonous gases, and servants and children destroyed, or their
constitutions injured, simply because housekeepers are not properly
instructed in this important branch of their profession.


FURNACES.

There is no improved mechanism in the economy of domestic life requiring
more intelligent management than furnaces. Let us then consider some
of the principles involved.

The earth is heated by radiation from the sun. The air is not warmed
by the passage of the sun's heat through it, but by convection from
the earth, in the same way that it is warmed by the surfaces of stoves.
The lower stratum of air is warmed by the earth and by objects which
have been warmed by radiated heat from the sun. The particles of air
thus heated expand, become lighter, and rise, being replaced by the
descent of the cooler and heavier particles from above, which, on being
warmed also rise, and give place to others. Owing to this process, the
air is warmest nearest the earth, and grows cooler as height increases.

The air has a strong attraction for water, and always holds a certain
quantity as invisible vapor. The warmer the air, the more moisture it
demands, and it will draw it from all objects within reach. The air
holds water according to its temperature. Thus, at fifty-two degrees,
Fahrenheit's thermometer, it holds half the moisture it can sustain;
but at thirty-six degrees, it will hold only one eighty-sixth part.
The earth and all plants and trees are constantly sending out moisture;
and when the air has received all it can hold, without depositing it
as dew, it is said to be _saturated_, and the point of temperature
at which dew begins to form, by condensation, upon the surface of the
earth and its vegetation, is called the _dew-point_. When air,
at a given temperature, has only forty per cent of the moisture it
requires for saturation, it is said to be dry. In a hot summer day,
the air will hold far more moisture than in cool days. In summer,
out-door air rarely holds less than half its volume of water. In 1838,
at Cambridge, Massachusetts, and New-Haven, Connecticut, at seventy
degrees, Fahrenheit, the air held eighty per cent of moisture.

In New Orleans, the air often retains ninety per cent of the moisture
it is capable of holding; and in cool days at the North, in foggy
weather, the air is sometimes wholly saturated.

When air holds all the moisture it can, without depositing dew, its
moisture is called 100. When it holds three fourths of this, it is
said to be at seventy-five per cent. When it holds only one half, it
is at fifty per cent. When it holds only one fourth, it is at
twenty-five per cent, etc.

Sanitary observers teach that the proper amount of moisture in the air
ranges from forty to seventy per cent of saturation.

Now, furnaces, which are of course used only in winter, receive outside
air at a low temperature, holding little moisture; This it sucks up,
like a sponge, from the walls and furniture of a house. If it is taken
into the human lungs, it draws much of its required moisture from the
body, often causing dryness of lips and throat, and painfully affecting
the lungs. Prof. Brewer, of the Scientific School of New-Haven, who
has experimented extensively on this subject, states that, while forty
per cent of moisture is needed in air to make it healthful, most stoves
and furnaces do not, by any contrivances, supply one half of this, or
not twenty per cent. He says most furnace-heated air is dryer than is
ever breathed in the hottest deserts of Sahara.

Thus, for want of proper instruction, most American housekeepers not
only poison their families with carbonic acid and starve them for want
of oxygen, but also diminish health and comfort for want of a due
supply of moisture in the air. And often when a remedy is sought, by
evaporating water in the furnace, it is without knowing that the amount
evaporated depends, not on the quantity of water in the vessel, but
on the extent of evaporating surface exposed to the air. A quart of
water in a wide shallow pan will give more moisture than two gallons
with a small surface exposed to heat.

There is also no little wise economy in expense attained by keeping
a proper supply of moisture in the air. For it is found that the body
radiates its heat less in moist than in dry air, so that a person feels
as warm at a lower temperature when the air has a proper supply of
moisture, as in a much higher temperature of dry air. Of course, less
fuel is needed to warm a house when water is evaporated in stove and
furnace-heated rooms. It is said by those who have experimented, that
the saving in fuel is twenty per cent when the air is duly supplied
with moisture.

There is a very ingenious instrument, called the hygrodeik, which
indicates the exact amount of moisture in the air. It consists of two
thermometers side by side, one of which has its bulb surrounded by
floss-silk wrapping, which is kept constantly wet by communication
with a cup of water near it. The water around the bulb evaporates just
in proportion to the heat of the air around it. The changing of water
to vapor draws heat from the nearest object, and this being the bulb
of the thermometer, the mercury is cooled and sinks. Then the difference
between the two thermometers shows the amount of moisture in the air
by a pointer on a dial-plate constructed by simple mechanism for this
purpose.

There is one very important matter in regard to the use of furnaces,
which is thus stated by Professor Brewer:

"I think it is a well-established fact that carbonic oxide will
pass through iron. It is always formed in great abundance in any
_anthracite_ fire, but especially in anthracite stoves and furnaces.
Moreover, furnaces _always_ leak, more or less; how much they leak
depending on the care and skill with which they are managed. Carbonic
oxide is much more poisonous than carbonic acid. Doubtless some carbonic
oxide finds its way into all furnace-heated houses, especially where
anthracite is used; the amount varying with the kind of furnace and its
management. As to how much escapes into a room, and its specific effect
upon the health of its occupants, we have no accurate data, no analysis
to show the quantity, and no observations to show the relation between
the quantity inhaled and the health of those exposed; all is mere
conjecture upon this point; but the inference is very strong that it has
a very injurious effect, producing headaches, weariness, and other
similar symptoms.

"Recent pamphlets lay the blame of all the bad effects of anthracite
furnaces and stoves to the carbonic oxide mingled in the air. I think
these pamphlets have a bad influence. _Excessive dryness_ also has bad
effects. So also the excessive heat in the evenings and coolness in the
mornings has a share in these evils. But how much in addition is owing
to carbonic oxide, we can not know, until we know something of the
actual amount of this gas in rooms, and as yet we know absolutely
nothing definite. In fact, it will be a difficult thing to _prove_."

There are other difficulties connected with furnaces which should be
considered. It is necessary to perfect health that an equal circulation
of the blood be preserved. The greatest impediment to this is keeping
the head warmer than the feet. This is especially to be avoided in a
nation where the brain is by constant activity drawing the blood from
the extremities. And nowhere is this more important than in schools,
churches, colleges, lecture and recitation-rooms, where the brain is
called into active exercise. And yet, furnace-heated rooms always keep
the feet in the coldest air, on cool floors, while the head is in the
warmest air.

Another difficulty is the fact that all bodies tend to radiate their
heat to each other, till an equal temperature exists. Thus, the human
body is constantly radiating its heat to the walls, floors, and cooler
bodies around. At the same time, a thermometer is affected in the same
way, radiating its heat to cooler bodies around, so that it always
marks a lower degree of heat than actually exists in the warm air
around it. Owing to these facts, the injected air of a furnace is
always warmer than is good for the lungs, and much warmer than is ever
needed in rooms warmed by radiation from fires or heated surfaces. The
cooler the air we inspire, the more oxygen is received, the faster the
blood circulates, and the greater is the vigor imparted to brain,
nerves, and muscles.

Scientific men have been contriving various modes of meeting these
difficulties, and at the close of this volume some results will be
given to aid a woman in selecting and managing the most healthful and
economical furnace, or in providing some better method of warming a
house. Some account will also be given of the danger involved in
gas-stoves, and some other recent inventions for cooking and heating.