Should the doors and windows of a room be closed with so much
nicety as to leave no crevices by which a supply of air can enter
sufficient for maintaining the fire, AFTER THE CURRENT OF AIR UP
THE CHIMNEY HAS BEEN DIMINISHED AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE BY
DIMINISHING THE THROAT OF THE FIRE-PLACE; in that case there
would be no other way of preventing the Chimney from smoking but
by opening a passage for the admission of fresh air from
without;--but this, I believe, will very seldom be found to be
the case.
A case more frequently to be met with is where currents of air
set down Chimnies in consequence of a diminution and rarefaction
of the air in a room, occasioned by the doors of the room opening
into passages or courts where the air is rarefied by the action
of some particular winds. In such cases the evil may be
remedied, either by causing the doors in question to close more
accurately,--or, (which will be still more effectual,) by giving
a supply of air to the passage or court which wants it, by some
other way.
Where the top of a Chimney is commanded by high buildings, by
clifts, or by high grounds, it will frequently happen, in windy
weather, that the eddies formed in the atmosphere by these
obstacles will blow down the Chimney, and beat down the smoke
into the room.--This it is true will be much less likely to
happen when the throat of the Chimney is contracted and properly
formed than when it is left quite open, and the Fire-place badly
constructed; but as it is POSSIBLE that a Chimney may be so
much exposed to these eddies in very high winds as to be made to
smoke sometimes when the wind blows with violence from a certain
quarter, it is necessary to show how the effects of those eddies
may be prevented.
Various mechanical contrivances have been imagined for
preventing the wind from blowing down Chimnies, and many of them
have been found to be useful;--there are, however, many of these
inventions, which, though they prevent the wind from blowing down
the Chimney, are so ill-contrived on other accounts as to
obstruct the ascent of the Smoke, and do more harm than good.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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