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LifeSpan House - Episode 04

Rumford Fireplace

Behind the Scenes - Lifespan House
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Installing a Rumford Fireplace
Count Rumford was a man ahead of his times. Born in Woburn, Massachusetts in 1753, he left the colonies in 1776 because of his Loyalist leanings and spent much of his life in Bavaria. Back in England in the 1790s he applied his understanding of fluid dynamics and the nature of heat to the design and development of a more efficient and clean burning fireplace.

Rumford recognized that it was the radiant heat generated by a fireplace that actually warmed the room. The air heated by the fire simply went up the chimney along with the smoke. So Rumford designed a much shallower fireplace with an opening that was both taller and wider with wide spread covings (sidewalls of the firebox) to reflect a greater amount of the radiant heat into the room. Rumford favored plastering and whitewashing the firebox to make it more reflective than traditional cast iron fire backs.

It's now questionable whether the whitewashing makes a difference. What is important is that with its unique wide and shallow shape it unquestionably reflects significantly more back into the room.

Streamlined Throat
The other ingenious aspect of the design was its streamlined rounded throat. The throat is the transition piece between the firebox and the flue. A traditional fireplace is equipped with an angled fire back and a lower lip to create a place for the room air and the smoke to roll their way up through the damper and out the chimney.

The Rumford has a straight fire back and the throat is rounded to create the funnel effect for a smoother airflow pattern. It works kind of like an airplane wing. It's designed to keep the air flowing in laminar fashion over the curved surface of the throat—shooting it, like a carburetor or the nozzle of a hose would do, into the smoke chamber. These fireplaces can be much wider at the opening and considerably taller and have much smaller throats than most traditional fireplaces. The Rumford can radiate more heat while using much less heated room air to remove the smoke from the fireplace.

Through modern day testing the Rumford Firebox is found to be an extremely clean-burning fireplace. The design of the throat also allows the clean air from the room to act as a shield to the smoke and be drawn up the chimney rather than escaping into the room. The throat is made of vitrified clay, as is the smoke chamber, this creates a smoother, cleaner surface that in turn is more reflective.

The Rumford fireplace was the perfect choice for the Lifespan house. Its tall proportions complement the home's classic Low Country style high ceilings and the herringbone pattern in which the bricks are laid lends a gracious touch. It's elegant, clean, and energy efficient.

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