Simple Tube Harvests Hot Air

Simple Tube Harvests Hot Air MISCELLANEOUS EQUIPMENT Miscellaneous 34-5-40 Hot air rises, but R.R. Johnson has a simple way of returning it to the floor instead of leaving it up by the ceiling. "I first saw the idea when visiting New York City many years ago," says Johnson. "I was in a tall building and felt hot air blowing down on me. I asked the doorman about it, and he explained that the building design included a shaft that gathered the hot air that had risen to the top of the building. A fan in the shaft pulled the hot air back to the ground floor." Johnson has incorporated the concept in a small house he is redoing on a limited budget. Though only installed in a single room, he says he's enjoying the benefit of the practice. "Even my wife says it's a great thing to do and definitely makes the room more comfortable," he says. Johnson, who says he values function over form, simply wedged a 4-in. diameter carpet tube between the floor and the ceiling. Holes were drilled in the tube at the top and the bottom. A small, five-watt fan, intended for use over a cat's litter box, provides the draw. Installed in the bottom of the tube, it pulls warm air down and pushes it out the holes in the bottom. "Any small fan would work," says Johnson. "The air return could be made to look like a column or integrated into a bookcase." Contact: FARM SHOW Followup, R. R. Johnson, 30 Chicken Hollow Rd., Newport, Penn. 17074 (ph 717 567-3810).

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