Getting heat out of the fireplace

[Fried Chicken]

I've been told adding an air source can make a significant difference. A friend of mine did this by literally boring holes through the floor in front of his fireplace & he swears by it

This works: the fireplace pulls outside air instead of inside air and radiates heat out.

I built a Rumford designed fireplace from I think about 1790. It has a shallow back wall revealing a large area to reflect heat out. It also has a full width throat with a smoke shelf behind and an adjustable flap to help prevent downdraught and also to stop heat escaping if fully closed when perhaps you are using other heat sources
My old fashioned builder gave me an earful saying he had never seen anything like it and it would never work, but in the Winter I caught him and his mate warming themselves when they should have been on the roof tiling! “ Well I never would have believed it!” They said!

He clearly wasn't old fashioned enough!


I did some reading about fireplace inserts, and maybe I need to overcome my biases. They achieve efficiencies of up to 80% where an open fireplace is happy to get 20%

https://forestry.com/best/best-wood-burning-fireplace-inserts-of-2024/

That said, I don't live somewhere cold so heating needs are minimal. I wish I could burn firewood inlieu of an air conditioner.