We have a living flame gas fire in our front room. I only ever use it in
desparation and then only on low.

I am about to put a radiator in that room which will complete the central
heating I started nearly 15 years ago! I wonder how much of the heat from
the rad is simply going to dissapear up the chimney, I am guessing it will
be quite a bit.

Anyone any real life experience of this? I have looked at numbers on the net
but these are from people selling solutions.

Ta.

R D S wrote:
We have a living flame gas fire in our front room. I only ever use it in
desparation and then only on low.

I am about to put a radiator in that room which will complete the central
heating I started nearly 15 years ago! I wonder how much of the heat from
the rad is simply going to dissapear up the chimney, I am guessing it will
be quite a bit.

Anyone any real life experience of this? I have looked at numbers on the net
but these are from people selling solutions.

Ta.


I have an open gas fire and have constructed a custom-made board, backed
with foam, that lodges against the flue plate, supported at the back by
a hinged "leg". I have now used it for about ten winters and am
convinced it is worthwhile as I can feel the draft when it's removed.
Obviously there needs to be a safeguard, such as a bright red stripe or
hanging ribbon possibly, to ensure no one uses the fire with it in
place. In fact, if there was children in the house, I doubt I would use
it at all. Also, blocking a chimney can cause condensation and so it
important it's removed once winter's over. I have had no problems
whatsoever.

Andy C

On Tue, 29 Sep 2009 17:17:35 +0100, "R D S" wrote:

We have a living flame gas fire in our front room. I only ever use it in
desparation and then only on low.

I am about to put a radiator in that room which will complete the central
heating I started nearly 15 years ago! I wonder how much of the heat from
the rad is simply going to dissapear up the chimney, I am guessing it will
be quite a bit.

Anyone any real life experience of this? I have looked at numbers on the net
but these are from people selling solutions.

Last house we had exactly what you describe and I used to use the fire
on the rare occasions we fancied that extra warmth and a bit of a cosy
glow. Otherwise....I made a template from cardboard and then used that
to make a thin plate from steel to slot above the fire and close the
chimney off. Edged it with double sided tape and pieces of draught
excluder to make a better seal and it worked a treat. A lit candle
held in the fireplace showed no flicker of movement. And yes, I did
forget about it once and lit the fire and yes, I did then yoink it out
after ten minutes and burnt myself.And broke a crystal glass from a
wedding present set when I dropped the thing like a, a, a hot plate.
Go figure. As they say.

If the flame effect fire is on...
- 65-85% of the fire kW input goes up the chimney
- In so doing the air feeding combustion must be replaced
- In heating the chimney it will tend to draw more air also
- So drawing cold air into the house & into that room

If the flame effect fire is off...
- Block the chimney with a tiny vent set on a panel
- Ensure you have a rain-cap on the chimney pot

You need to limit rain ingress - 250cm annually.
LCD TV w/ flame effect picture might pay for itself in a year :-)

On 29 Sep, 17:17, "R D S" wrote:
We have a living flame gas fire in our front room. I only ever use it in
desparation and then only on low.

I am about to put a radiator in that room which will complete the central
heating I started nearly 15 years ago! I wonder how much of the heat from
the rad is simply going to dissapear up the chimney, I am guessing it will
be quite a bit.

Anyone any real life experience of this? I have looked at numbers on the net
but these are from people selling solutions.

Ta.

we fitted stoves in place of our open fires- so not direct experience
per se BUT I do remember an inflatable chimney bung that would do what
you want - can;t remember the tradename tho - sorry!

From memory you inflated it with a bike pump and it was supposed to
seal it all up nicely - when you want to use the fire let it down and
out it came. Had a red ribbon to remind you it as there...

it may help
cheers
JimK

"R D S" wrote in message
...
We have a living flame gas fire in our front room. I only ever use it in
desparation and then only on low.

I am about to put a radiator in that room which will complete the central
heating I started nearly 15 years ago! I wonder how much of the heat from
the rad is simply going to dissapear up the chimney, I am guessing it will
be quite a bit.

A lot, but even more if you turn the fire on.

On Tue, 29 Sep 2009 10:15:59 -0700 (PDT), jim wrote:

BUT I do remember an inflatable chimney bung that would do what
you want - can;t remember the tradename tho - sorry!

"chimney balloon" will turn up various models...

One of the links is to Money Saving Expert, apart from tales of CO
posioning from fires used with the chimney blocked, there is the use
of a bin bag suffed with loft insulation.

--
Cheers
Dave.

"R D S" wrote in message
...
We have a living flame gas fire in our front room. I only ever use it in
desparation and then only on low.

I am about to put a radiator in that room which will complete the central
heating I started nearly 15 years ago! I wonder how much of the heat from
the rad is simply going to dissapear up the chimney, I am guessing it will
be quite a bit.

Anyone any real life experience of this? I have looked at numbers on the
net but these are from people selling solutions.


I've filled a carrier bag with those polystyrene packing beads and stuffed
it up the mouth of the chimney. The ignition mechanism is beneath the fire,
so we put a warning note next to the ignition switch - out of view unless
you're actually lighting the fire.

"jim" wrote in message
...
we fitted stoves in place of our open fires- so not direct experience
per se BUT I do remember an inflatable chimney bung that would do what
you want - can;t remember the tradename tho - sorry!

From memory you inflated it with a bike pump and it was supposed to
seal it all up nicely - when you want to use the fire let it down and
out it came. Had a red ribbon to remind you it as there...

I'm not as mad as I thought then, I had the idea of sticking summat
inflatable up there.

In article ,
"R D S" writes:
We have a living flame gas fire in our front room. I only ever use it in
desparation and then only on low.

I am about to put a radiator in that room which will complete the central
heating I started nearly 15 years ago! I wonder how much of the heat from
the rad is simply going to dissapear up the chimney, I am guessing it will
be quite a bit.

Anyone any real life experience of this? I have looked at numbers on the net
but these are from people selling solutions.

When I did my calcs, I recall seeing 1kW suggested as the heat loss
up an open flue (when no fire alight).

Unless you remove the fire and cap off the gas, I'm pretty sure
you will be forbidden from blocking the flue off in any way.
Comes under the "how to die fast" heading.

--
Andrew Gabriel
[email address is not usable -- followup in the newsgroup]