Cob: fire and air

[Amanda Peck]

Air intakes are sometimes a (larger than one would think?, like 6 inches or 
so??) pipe coming in through the foundation.  If a fireplace, then seems 
like the diagrams I've seen--not sure I've ever seen the real thing--have 
the air intake split and coming in from both sides, up enough that it 
doesn't get clogged with ashes.  Not sure how it's normally done on a 
woodstove.

Some of the cob fireplaces/ovens/stoves ARE partially lined with firebrick, 
because you are doing clay-firing temperatures right above the 
fire--Actually we could sort of do that with the fireplace in the family 
house in North Carolina.  But it wasn't anybody's idea of a good tile when I 
got through with it.  Not even mine, and I was probably about 11 then.

The clay version of the Rocket stoves depend on draft to spread the heat, 
don't they? these are the ones that are sometimes have the firebox outside 
the house on one end, the heated air going through a bench--with or without 
a stop at a stove--and exiting on the other side of the building.

Think bread ovens.  Consider the fired earth-block buildings from Nader 
Khalili.

Paying a crew of experts to install a $30,000 (?) Tulikivi masonry stove 
(they're not only gorgeous, but imported, and I remember that as being 
absolutely top of the line, but....) in your house is probably, except for 
the expense, simpler.  You're less likely to make a mistake that way.  
Building with cob IS risking making mistakes--of a different kind than 
putting in a stove that completely prices your house out of the market.



...........
Jill wrote, probably in response to Chandra:

I, too, was thinking to put the heater (fireplace) in the middle of the 
house; with the idea it would more easily heat the entire house.
However, I am thinking that while the chimney would go up to the roof, where 
is the air intake coming from - under the house? Otherwise, the fire would 
draw from inside the house.
Also, someone told me that a cob fireplace, while fine with an open face, 
would crack under the intense heat of a closed system such as the masonry 
design. Thoughts?
Jill


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