"Vir Campestris" wrote in message
...
It used to be we had open fires. But then hot water radiators came in -
much cleaner, and easier to manage.

Nowadays we seem to be moving towards underfloor heating - where
effectively the entire floor is a radiator. Efficient, but slow to
respond.

But there was a time when hot air systems were popular, and I think still
are in the USA.

Does anyone know why they went out of fashion? It can't just be because
they made a great place for spiders to hide!

I'll tell you why. To be blunt - because it didn't f***ing work ;-)

The house that my parents bought (new build) in 1972 had a huge
floor-to-ceiling gas boiler for ducted-air central heating. It needed its
foam air-filters cleaning out of dust every week. It made a very loud noise
and so was relegated to the downstairs cloakroom, away from any room that we
used. That room was lovely and warm - so a lot of heat was being "wasted"
instead of heating the rest of the house. The house was always cold, because
what came out of the floor ducts was a feeble breath of air that was barely
tepid. The only room that was warm was the lounge, because that had a gas
fire in it. Ducted air also made the house dusty - it kept dust in
circulation which would otherwise sink into the carpet and remain "hidden"
until the room was hoovered. Being facetious now, it was also a "great" way
to spread nasty smells around the house: one time there was a horrible
sweaty-foot smell in some of the bedrooms, which we eventually traced to the
duct in my sister's room where she'd shoved an unwanted cheese sandwich as a
prank ;-) My parents were on the point of having the ducted-air system
replaced with a conventional radiator system, because we all hated it so
much, but then dad got a new job so we moved and passed the problem onto the
new owner.

I'm sure ducted-air technology (insulation of ducts, efficiency of boiler)
has improved a *lot* in 50 years, but can it *really* heat a house up as
quickly and to such a high temperature as hot-water radiators (fed from a
boiler that is powered by whatever fuel is currently not condemned)?

When we were house-hunting the other year, we looked at one house where the
owner was proud of the energy-efficient heating system. But through the
whole house we were conscious of a continuous moaning noise which I presume
was the noise of the air fan being propagated along the ducts. I stood in
front of a duct - yes, the air was almost stone cold, just like it had been
in my parents' house.