Fireplace Bellows

One of the most decorative and frequently underrated fireplace tool is the fireplace bellows. Often times people will have a full set of tools that includes a poker, a broom and a dustpan, but no fireplace bellows. The bellows is a classic good looking old fashioned tool, but it is also very functional.

There is a certain amount of skill required to light a real wood fire and if you use a wood burning fireplace stove for heat, cooking, or both. You don’t have time to mess around crumpling newspapers and babying your fire. Fires require fuel to burn they need something to burn such as wood and they need oxygen and a heat source to complete the combustion process. A fresh piece of wood will not instantly start burning when placed in a fire. It needs to be hot enough to start burning.

You can build a traditional fire and get a new log burning by layer the fire with thinner combustible materials and as they catch fire faster and begin to burn, you hope that along the way your new log will heat up enough to catch fire. So you layer your fire with thin crumpled paper. Paper is thin and will catch fire fast, and the crumples leave little oxygen pockets which are required for burning. On top of this paper you can layer some thin kindling wood so that as the paper burns down the kindling will catch fire. As the kindling burns hopefully if you have enough of it and the fire is hot enough your log will heat up enough to start burning. Have you ever noticed how a lot starts to smoke right before it begins to burn? This is combustion create by the combination of wood, oxygen, and heat.

Oxygen can cause a flame to burn faster, longer, and hotter. So if you find a way to pump extra oxygen into your fire and concentrate it right where the extra heat is needed, you can start a fire without having to worry about layers and layers of paper or other fire starter materials. This is where the fireplace bellows comes in. With a bellows you can feed your fire fresh oxygen right where it is needed.

Some people who take their wood burning fireplaces and stoves seriously even invest in power bellows, which is a modern day metal bellows tube that is powered by batteries. This is a no frills device that blows air where you want it and gets your fire hot very fast. The traditional hand bellows are still a popular fireplace tool and they are a very decorative fireplace accessory too.

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