Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 92.djvu/373

 Popular Science Moutiily

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��deemable are cast out upon the scrap heap or dump.

This general scrap pile, with its mass of broken and twisted chassis frames, axles, motors, wheels and what not, does not present a beautiful or cheerful picture. It is as a battlefield after a terrific battle, covered with the victims of the struggle. To think of the past glory of the racers and roadsters, limousines and runabouts, the disinembered parts of which now lie in a con- fused mass, rusting and rotting in every kind of weather, might inspire a poat to write an "Elegy of the Scrap Pile."

As a result of the higher prices paid for

metals during the last year, there are now many junk organizations which buy a car too old to run or just able to wheeze, for from fifty to two hundred dollars, with no intention of ever letting the machine run another yard. By the time the parts are melted up you may find some of your old car in that new one you just bought.

���Upholstered parts contain horsehair, wool and other valuable material which may be used again

���mass of broken and tangled metal about the sight presented by this junk

��The Open Grate Fires We Love Are Very Wasteful

THERE is something so cheerful and companionable in an open grate fire that even prosaic folk succumb to its charm. For many centuries, the open hearth or grate was the only means of heating dwellings during the inclement

season, but times and con- ditions have changed and to-day grate fires are not taken seriously as a heating method. They still survive in that capacity in the somno- lent backwoods and are pre- served for or- namental o r sentimental purposes even in modern apartments. But they have outlived their usefulness, and are doomed like other institutions of a remote past that do not fit into present conditions.

From a sentimental point of view open grate fires may be desirable, but practical and economical business sense must con- demn them as the most wasteful and in- o3icient method of heating. This would hold true even under more favorable con- ditions, but in the present day, when the most stringent economy of fuel is obliga- tory, the continuance of open grate fires for the purpose of heating would mean criminal wastefulness.

Into the grate one puts fuel that has the power of producing a great deal of heat, but the useful heat obtained from the fuel by that method is extremely small. Most of the warmth produced goes up the chimney, with a large quantity of air from the room. This air is replaced by cold air drawn in through the cracks in the windward side of the house. Such a method of ventilating is altogether too expensive and wasteful. A stove would be far more economical, and to-day econ- omy is the first consideration.

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