Whats the heat loss on a fire without a fireback

oxygen_old

Hey. I have a gas fire in my house with a fairly horrendous fireplace. I was thinking if I remove the fireplace, the fireback, hollow it out, and get a new gas fire in it. Thing is, I dont know what the fireloss would be like. I know a guy down the road done this, sans any fire. He just put some candles in it, and it looks fairly cool.

fmcc

not joking heat loss i guess would be about 85-90% of the heat generated from the fire if you mean from the house not sure cant see it being that much more than it is now.

RKQ

A precast fireback / throat is designed to replace fire bricks and is shaped to "throw" heat back into room. The top is shaped at a slope to improve draw of smoke while helping prevent downdraughts.

If the original fire had fire brick, then removing the conc. fireback will increase the ope size, decrease draw, possibly increase down-draught and make the fire slightly less efficient.

Ventilation is important with any gas fire.

oxygen_old

crap, if the loss is going to be up to 90 per cent I dont think it will be worth it.
Time to start looking at fireplaces I suppose:rolleyes:

Im not sure if the original was fire brick or not. It was one of the larger opening fireplaces. There is about a half a foot diamater semi circle above the fireplace that is plastered over. It originally had one of the large wooden fireplaces.

oxygen_old

is there a way to tell if a chimney is firebrick (without taking out the fireback preferably). Also can I add some firebrick to it?

blackbox

If efficiency is important to you, you will need a gas stove rather than an open fire. An open gas fire is little more than an ornament.

ger34

Have a crumbling fireback in a turf burning fireplace which needs replacing.Have heard of an appliance called a fireplace insert (i think) available from Griffin Hawe in Athy,has anyone got any information on these appliances?