Basement only heating?

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1Dtml

1Dtml

Feeling the Heat
Nov 22, 2011
306
CT
I'm looking for a cozy working environment in my basement with nice warm flooring on the first floor, and have a few questions.
My basement is 1000sq/ft with one corner a walkout with two windows and a door. The basement ceiling is insulated, and so is the walk out wooden walls, but the rest is concrete walls and floor.

I don't need to heat the other floors of the house, for my other pellet stove has that covered.

I'm looking at a Lennox Cascade that is rated at 30,000 BTU/hr, and a Heatilator Eco-Choice CAB50 that is rated at 49,900 BTU/hr for around the same $$, but I will consider other options (but not at twice the cost).

My priorities are reliable operation, efficiency (don't need a pellet hog), not having clean the stove every other day to keep it running well, and staying on a budget under $2500.00 (I will do my own install).

Any thoughts of what size stove makes the most sense, and any first hand experience with any of these stoves will be very helpful.

Should I be looking at removing the insulation in the basement ceiling to warm the first floor floors, or is insulation always a good thing?

Thanks,

1D
 
I'm currently doing what you want to.

1000 sq ft, no walkout, no ceiling insulation, 2" foam on the outside of poured walls.

It works better than I expected but it nevers gets below 55ish down there.

Doing it with a Englander 25pdvc.
 
Those open concrete walls will absorb the heat as quick as the stove makes it.
You will obviously feel a difference running the stove but it will be like heating the upstairs with the windows open.
You really should insulate the walls .
 
With your budget of $2500 I`d buy a used stove for under $1,000 and spend the rest on studding and insulation.
 
I was thinking about doing the same. I have a 1200 sq ft walkout basement. Everything is insulated and has drywall. Without any heat on down there it stays around 50-55. I have a 5000 watt 220v electric heat but it stays off unless I am down there working.

My only issue is I'm sure it's not code to put a pellet stove down there. It is a pretty much a garage. We keep the cars in there and all kinds of others flammables. No gasoline though.

The silly thing is there is a wall mounted tankless hot water heater about 3 feet from my wife's car. It has a power exhaust fan but that thing throws a huge flame.
 
Gio said:
Those open concrete walls will absorb the heat as quick as the stove makes it.
You will obviously feel a difference running the stove but it will be like heating the upstairs with the windows open.
You really should insulate the walls .
Click to expand...

My pdvc will raise the temp from 55 to 68 in a few hours running on heat level 5.

Maybe open concrete walls aren't that bad if their insulated on the outside.

What do you think of that?
 
smoke show said:
Gio said:
Those open concrete walls will absorb the heat as quick as the stove makes it.
You will obviously feel a difference running the stove but it will be like heating the upstairs with the windows open.
You really should insulate the walls .
Click to expand...

My pdvc will raise the temp from 55 to 68 in a few hours running on heat level 5.

Maybe open concrete walls aren't that bad if their insulated on the outside.

What do you think of that?
Click to expand...

Is your 2" foam on the inside of the concrete(inside the basement), or on the outside (outside the basement)?
 
Outside. I was prepared to do the inside also after hearing it won't work.

I was pleasantly surprised at how well it works. No doubt it would be even better w/interior insulation.

YMMV
 
My bet is on the CAB-50. Its basically a Quadrafire stove with a different exterior. Has a large hopper and a clean-out for the burn pot. A Forum member ( Eric at Kinsman Stoves) has one running in his shop. Great stove for the price and you have the added BTU's if you ever need it. Should do just fine in a basement and wont have to crank it to get the heat. IMO
 
I heat the basement with my stove 3/4 insulation on walls with wallboard. Leave the stove running 24/7 on lowest setting have no problem maintaining 76 degrees. I had to tweek the three bottom setting to keep it that low. It burns around 3/4 of a bag a day. I think leave out the ceiling insulation, my bonus was my NG bill was cut in half for up stairs.
 
I heat my basment with a Englander 25PDV set to 2 or 3 when it get below 20 degrees. It did not have any insulation in the beginning, i have since insulated most of the 1800 SQ feet celing and walls. it is a walk out with a large slider and 36 inch door along with one floor to celing window. I use between 1.5 and 2 bags a day. The basement always stays in the mid 70,s. another big plus is that my oil bill has been reduced by half. I have R32 in the celings of the third floor celing of a 5000 sf house. I now only burn 600 gallons of oil a year now, it use to be 1200 gallons. Putting the stove in the basement was a great money saver . by the way , the wall board and insulation was put up to install lighting, the basement is below grade and the temp was always in the 50's year round. I heated thsi basement for four year swithout insulation and it held the heat just fine, provided your basement is sub grade in new England.
 
Insulation is insulation weather it is inside or outside. The concrete can act as a large heat sink and even out the temperature swings if the insulation is on the outside. It may take some time to warm up. The thing is to keep the heat inside the shell.

Bare uninsulated concrete is a fairly good heat conductor.

Consult a good heat loss calculator and run the numbers. www.builditsolar.com has one plus a ton of other useful information.
 
SmokeyTheBear said:
Insulation is insulation weather it is inside or outside. The concrete can act as a large heat sink and even out the temperature swings if the insulation is on the outside. It may take some time to warm up. The thing is to keep the heat inside the shell.

Bare uninsulated concrete is a fairly good heat conductor.

Consult a good heat loss calculator and run the numbers. www.builditsolar.com has one plus a ton of other useful information.
Click to expand...

Interesting, so is your point "don't insulate over the concrete walls, but keep the basement up to temperatures, so not to have to try to heat up cold concrete, or am I missing something?
 
1Dtml said:
SmokeyTheBear said:
Insulation is insulation weather it is inside or outside. The concrete can act as a large heat sink and even out the temperature swings if the insulation is on the outside. It may take some time to warm up. The thing is to keep the heat inside the shell.

Bare uninsulated concrete is a fairly good heat conductor.

Consult a good heat loss calculator and run the numbers. www.builditsolar.com has one plus a ton of other useful information.
Click to expand...

Interesting, so is your point "don't insulate over the concrete walls, but keep the basement up to temperatures, so not to have to try to heat up cold concrete, or am I missing something?
Click to expand...

No my point is to insulate period it makes no difference from a heat loss perspective if the insulation is on the inside or outside. The difference will be in the fact that when the insulation is on the outside the concrete walls are going to act as a heat storage device and will use up some the BTUs the stove produces, the walls will release those BTUs when the air temperature inside the walls drops below that of the concrete.

This method is employed in a number of passive solar designs by including massive stone, brick, or concrete objects inside the house's envelope to soak up energy from the sun, or in other applications such as various heat producing fast fired fireplaces and heaters.
 
SmokeyTheBear said:
1Dtml said:
SmokeyTheBear said:
Insulation is insulation weather it is inside or outside. The concrete can act as a large heat sink and even out the temperature swings if the insulation is on the outside. It may take some time to warm up. The thing is to keep the heat inside the shell.

Bare uninsulated concrete is a fairly good heat conductor.

Consult a good heat loss calculator and run the numbers. www.builditsolar.com has one plus a ton of other useful information.
Click to expand...

Interesting, so is your point "don't insulate over the concrete walls, but keep the basement up to temperatures, so not to have to try to heat up cold concrete, or am I missing something?
Click to expand...

No my point is to insulate period it makes no difference from a heat loss perspective if the insulation is on the inside or outside. The difference will be in the fact that when the insulation is on the outside the concrete walls are going to act as a heat storage device and will use up some the BTUs the stove produces, the walls will release those BTUs when the air temperature inside the walls drops below that of the concrete.

This method is employed in a number of passive solar designs by including massive stone, brick, or concrete objects inside the houses envelope to soak up energy form the sun, or in other applications such as various heat producing fast fired fireplaces and heaters.
Click to expand...

Gotcha, so as far as insulation goes, leave the insulation in the basement ceiling, and add 2" foam insulation over the concrete walls because I'm not digging up my foundation to put it on the outside. :ahhh:

Any advice with big stove vs smaller stove?

Thanks

1D
 
1Dtml said:
SmokeyTheBear said:
1Dtml said:
SmokeyTheBear said:
Insulation is insulation weather it is inside or outside. The concrete can act as a large heat sink and even out the temperature swings if the insulation is on the outside. It may take some time to warm up. The thing is to keep the heat inside the shell.

Bare uninsulated concrete is a fairly good heat conductor.

Consult a good heat loss calculator and run the numbers. www.builditsolar.com has one plus a ton of other useful information.
Click to expand...

Interesting, so is your point "don't insulate over the concrete walls, but keep the basement up to temperatures, so not to have to try to heat up cold concrete, or am I missing something?
Click to expand...

No my point is to insulate period it makes no difference from a heat loss perspective if the insulation is on the inside or outside. The difference will be in the fact that when the insulation is on the outside the concrete walls are going to act as a heat storage device and will use up some the BTUs the stove produces, the walls will release those BTUs when the air temperature inside the walls drops below that of the concrete.

This method is employed in a number of passive solar designs by including massive stone, brick, or concrete objects inside the houses envelope to soak up energy form the sun, or in other applications such as various heat producing fast fired fireplaces and heaters.
Click to expand...

Gotcha, so as far as insulation goes, leave the insulation in the basement ceiling, and add 2" foam insulation over the concrete walls because I'm not digging up my foundation to put it on the outside. :ahhh:

Any advice with big stove vs smaller stove?

Thanks

1D
Click to expand...

That insulation is there to keep the floors above it warm if you remove it the heat loss from the basement into the upper story has to be allowed for in sizing your stove.

The perspective from the stove in the basement is removing it will require a larger stove and increase heat loss.

What is the ceiling like in the basement?
 
The basement ceiling is open, and made from engineered squeakless I beam type joists with engineered tongue and groove plywood on top. The basement ceiling height is 7' 8" off the concrete basement floor.
 
Ok so this insulation is batt.

If the stove is always going to be running in the basement it wouldn't hurt to remove that insulation, however if the stove isn't always going to be running that floor above is going to get chilly.

No matter what you decide the area around the sill needs to be insulated and sealed.

If there was a finished ceiling there I wouldn't even contemplate removing the insulation. In any event there may also be a code requirement for insulation to be used there, fire block etc ...

It would also pay for you to make use of any insulation you remove up in the attic or elsewhere in the house.

Please note you also need to take any moisture levels into consideration.
 
Thank you for all the information Smokey, and others, so I was told by the stove sales people that a smaller stove may be better because "burning hotter to get the heat needed kept the stove and piping cleaner." Any truth to this?

1D
 
The CAB-50 will burn clean on its low setting. My Quad burns the same on Low as it does on Med or High. Other models may be different. But Quads (Heatlilator included) have an abundance of air to feed the pellets.

Remember. You can only turn a little stove up so far. A Big stove can be turned down. Also, I would use 4" vent from the basement. If you use a Clean-out T, 6 ft vert, 90* and 3 ft horiz, you will be at a 16' EVL. Maximum EVL for 3" is 15'. Bigger stove, Bigger Hopper, and and Ash dump would lead me to the Heatilator.

Other models have problems on Low settings. The Lennox may or may not. I have no experience with one. But I only run my Quad on Low and have Zero problems. My 2 cents.
 
and agreeing with smokey, if you intend to keep the basement warm and remove the insulation
the floor upstairs will be warm to walk on
and radiant heat upstairs will help
 
It is nice to keep the stove and venting clean, you want the stove to be able to handle the load it is going to face on the coldest day at the mid point of its firing rates. You can always run it on a t-stat on a fairly high firing rate, however if you get a small stove that can just keep up with things at its highest setting you have no room for those record setting cold events or fast temperature recovery when something requires the stove to be off for sometime.
 
DexterDay said:
The CAB-50 will burn clean on its low setting. My Quad burns the same on Low as it does on Med or High. Other models may be different. But Quads (Heatlilator included) have an abundance of air to feed the pellets.

Remember. You can only turn a little stove up so far. A Big stove can be turned down. Also, I would use 4" vent from the basement. If you use a Clean-out T, 6 ft vert, 90* and 3 ft horiz, you will be at a 16' EVL. Maximum EVL for 3" is 15'. Bigger stove, Bigger Hopper, and and Ash dump would lead me to the Heatilator.

Other models have problems on Low settings. The Lennox may or may not. I have no experience with one. But I only run my Quad on Low and have Zero problems. My 2 cents.
Click to expand...

Would you recommend using their top vent adapter, or a clean-out T?

Does the clean-out T, or their top vent adapter count as a 90*?

Are there min bend requirements for the OAK?

Nice to hear this stove has no problems at low settings.

Thanks for the info!

1D
 
Another vote for the CAB-50.

If the stove does only require low fire rate, Just crank it up once in a while. An hour or so of high fire will clean it out. But I'd say you won't see low all that much with the cement sucking up the heat on ya! I'd want a stove with some room for the cold days. The little stove might not cut it in the minus temps!
 
j-takeman said:
Another vote for the CAB-50.

If the stove does only require low fire rate, Just crank it up once in a while. An hour or so of high fire will clean it out. But I'd say you won't see low all that much with the cement sucking up the heat on ya! I'd want a stove with some room for the cold days. The little stove might not cut it in the minus temps!
Click to expand...

He is going to insulate the basement Jay.
 
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