floor grate

7.10 Floor grate with great design

7.10.USA-3-detail-b Highlights Relevant to Sustainable Design:

We can rethink saving heating fuel by sharing heat between floors.

This floor grate allows the heat from the fireplace on the first floor to rise up through the house. The grate has qualities of function and aesthetic shared by the S braces on the mill, the barn cupolas, and the shutter dogs. They work simply and have an appealing look, versus just one or the other. The bottom of this sketch shows a cross-section drawing of the floor grate. The louvers are moved easily by foot to regulate the amount of air coming up to circulate through the house. This type of design was used before we had ducted central heating and cooling systems, but there is absolutely no reason why sharing climate control between floors does not make sense today. We could take the concept and make it high-tech in a few strategic locations within floors and walls, using smart sensors to balance air temperature and auto closedowns to have separate temperature zones tied to programmable thermostats. Some products are already on the market, for walls, and advancing old ideas with new technology is a theme of sustainable design.

Author and illustrator: Charlie Szoradi is an architect, inventor, and the CEO of Independence LED Lighting. He writes about many other topics related to floor grate design through his extensive travels around the world.

If you have found this posting online, it is an excerpt from Mr. Szoradi’s book Learn from Looking that served as the inspiring seed content for this drawing share resource. For additional drawings and insights on floor grate and interior temperature control, we hope that you enjoy exploring LearnfromLooking.com. You can search via general terms such as sustainability as well as narrower terms such as floor grate and smart sensor.

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