Totally Flueless

There is something that has gone from my life that I miss terribly, a wood burning stove. I had one in my study in a previous domestic incarnation and used to fire it up in the winter until it was almost incandescent. It was total bliss sweating in my shirtsleeves, two fingers of malt, dogs snuffling in their sleep, rereading Conrad or London to the snap crackle and pop of a truly overdone log fire and the fragrance of my smouldering boots.

Regrettably Mrs Ivan the second will not countenance it. She agrees that it is all tres charmant while it is happening but leaves a residue of smoke, dust and ashes over everything, in and out of sight, also that the cleaning out and refuelling creates even more mess. I cannot say she is wrong. I have had the concession that if I sign a legally drawn up contract to redecorate and replace all soft furnishings on an annual basis at my own cost, then she will sanction the installation of the aforementioned stove. I don't much fancy this and as we have an agreed rule of consensus on all domestic puchases I have to fret in in a centrally heated desert.

So when my company invested in particulate filtrating welding helmets for the fabricators it set me to thinking... These helmets have an air compressor which feeds through a high efficiency filter to blow a stream of cool ultra clean air over the faces of the welders protecting them from smoke inhalation and making life a lot more pleasant. So lets have a pot bellied stove with a short crooked chimney containing an extraction fan and a larger version of the same filter to completely remove the smoke and other particles, before discharging the cleaned air back into the room. The negative air pressure would prevent any escape from the front of the stove and also assist the creation of a satisfactory blaze by drawing air through the newly lit fire. Obviously carbon monoxide is the next problem, this could be removed by passing the air through a canister of a catalyst for its conversion to carbon dioxide. NASA have developed a compound which does this at room temperature and it should work even better in the hot chimney. Lastly put the whole thing on elegant castors so that it can be wheeled outside for cleaning and refuelling.

So now even people who don't possess chimneys can bask in the pleasure of a real fire without the grime, mess and recriminations.