Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1880-05-08
ventilating Bedrooms.

ventilating Bedrooms.
In some houses it is not difficult to bring
a four-inch wooden tube through the whole
length of partition from the top to the
bottom floor of house, and to let sup
ly of air enter that tube at the upper part,
and distribute air to every room that lies
in its course. On rising in the morning
the bedroom windows should be opened at
the top and bottom equally, and, except
when the weather is very wet, they should
remain open until the sun begins to 90
down. 1t is bad practice to leave the
windows open late in the day, and this es-
pecially in the winter. The air becomes
charged with damp, and damp air is really
as dangerous, if not more dangerous, than
a close air. To sleep in damp air is quite
as bad as to sleep in damp sheets, and is a
most common cause of rheumatism, neu-
ralgia and chronic cold or catarrh. When
the windows of the bedroom are closed the
door ought also to be closed, and the en-
trance of air into the room be allowed to
take place only through the COM
munication with the external air.
While provision is made for the en-
trance of air, an equal provision
should also be made for the escape of air.
This is best effected by an opening in the
chimney shaft near to the ceiling where
there is, as there ought always to be,
fireplace and shaft. The opening for the
exit of air up the shaft may be protected
by an Arnott's valve. The late Dr. Chowne
invented a process of exit ventilation which
answers well for bedrooms, and to which
he gave the name of "siphon ventilation.
The name was very unfortunate, because
there is no siphon principle it, and owing
to this plan received very severe handling
by the late Dr. Neil Arnott. The plan
nevertheless is very good and clearly, and
when from an Arnott valve smoke and dust
issue, as they often will in rooms placed at
the upper part of house, the Chowne tube
is excellent. A three or four-inch piece of
stove-piping is let into the wall from the
ceiling down to the mantel-piece. Near
the ceiling the tube opens into the room.
At the mantel-shelf the tube is made to
turn at right angle into the chimney. At
all times there is a current of air down this
tube into the chimney, and when there is a
FIRE in the crate the exit current is ex-
tremelY sharp and effective, while
there is always freedom from SCOT
and smoke in the room, an advantage
and resistance caused by the tube.
% Chowne's plan is so effective and simple
that I have often brought it temporarily
into action in closed rooms by simply turn
ing piece of stove-piping into chimney
at the fireplace and running a straight
piece of tubing from the elbow up to near
the ceiling, and temporarily fixing it
against the wall When the exit ventila-
- L. L l.
shaft owing to the circumstance that there
is no fireplace or shaft, it is next best to
carry it out into the staircase by dia-
phragm opening made over the door of the
room. An openingatwelve inches long and
four inches wide is made vertically through
the wall in the space over the door. Into
this opening is placed a metal frame as
wide as the thickness of the wall, with
partition or diaphragm of thin metal
planted vertically in the center of it. When
this metal frame is fixed in the wall cur
rent of air will be found to pass,
after the room is closed, into the room
son one side of the diaphragm and out
sof the room on the other side. This secures
AN outer current, which is better by far
than none at all, but it also admits cur
rent into the room from the house, which
to certain extent Is Objectionable. 1t has
been recommended by some sanitarians to
ventilate the bedroom from the window by
the plan of costless ventilation of DIR. Peter
Hinches Bird. In this plan the lower sash
of the window is raised a few inches, the
space between the window and the window
sill being filled up bya solid piece of wood.
A space is IN this way left between the two
sashes, up which flows constant current
of air. have tried this method, and l
have modified it by letting the upper sash
down and filling up the space between it
and the top part of the window-frame with
board, which is. think, the better ar
rangement, and for staircases do not think
anything is SO good. But in bedrooms, the
windows of which are opened and closed so
frequently, and which have blinds, the
plan does not answer SO well as the tube of
which have spoken. There are more fire.
quent draughts from the window, and not,
l think, so regular supply of air.-IB. w.
n