floor registers, illegal or not?

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leff13

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Feb 13, 2014
49
Pennsylvania
I plan on getting a harman p43 for my 900 square foot home. I know it will heat my first floor up great, i need a way to get the heat upstairs, from what i read i finally understand the process of cool air has to be pushed down for the heat to rise, i also read everywhere that cutting floor registers is highly illegal and not fire safe. i have 2 ceiling fans in the first floor where the stove will be, if i cut 2 vents in the ceiling will that allow enough cool air from upstairs to travel downstairs and will the heat naturally rise better or will you need another set of vents to allow the air back up, im wondering if the ceiling fans will help either push or pull the air to help, any input to clarify this topic please please!!!
 
i would also like to add i build manufactured houses for a living, i remember building a 40 box hotel and everything had to be firesafe, drywall, doors, caulking, etc.. i remember installing these collars that fit inside the ductwork to from what i understand close at a certain temp, but they were really thing metal, wondering if installing something like this inside a fireproof box in the ceiling would be approved or not? just an idea i guess, plus i could get these at my work for cost!!
 
As much as I commend you for trying to make sure things will work at the same time the unit is installed, I would have to recommend that you wait and see if you have a problem heating things before you go and make holes in the floor.

Additionally, yes, the fire dampers you mention do make floor penetrations safer,,,, however I'll reiterate, I'd make darn sure you need the floor registers before putting them in.

My biggest concern, even with fire dampers installed, is that after cutting the holes in your floors you may still not get the heat movement you are hoping for.

Again, don't fix something like this unless you know it is broke!
 
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pen said:
As much as I commend you for trying to make sure things will work at the same time the unit is installed, I would have to recommend that you wait and see if you have a problem heating things before you go and make holes in the floor.

Additionally, yes, the fire dampers you mention do make floor penetrations safer,,,, however I'll reiterate, I'd make darn sure you need the floor registers before putting them in.

My biggest concern, even with fire dampers installed, is that after cutting the holes in your floors you may still not get the heat movement you are hoping for.

Again, don't fix something like this unless you know it is broke!
Click to expand...
yeah i totally understand and that's great advice, i just would love to know everything before going through the expense of installing a stove, better to be safe than sorry i guess, i'm hoping to not have to hack the floors and ceilings to install vents, i would try the stove first to see if the heat would rise naturally im just afraid it wont
 
outside of the code question (which i assume is best answered by which local authority has jurisdiction and/or your home insurance provider), and pen's advice above, i'm inclined to think that blowing cold air down directly through vents would work very well.
having the vent somewhere above the stove room so the cold/returning air displaces the warm air to the rest of the house.
and not only will you be pushing cold air down, the back side of the fan will at the same time help pull the warm air (that is already being pushed/displaced) up your stairs and any other paths available.
you could run the fan at a very low rate to keep sound and felt breezes to a bare minimum.
over time it should pretty much even out temps throughout.
theoretically.;lol

having a fan in or on the vent would also make it a more passive feeling airflow instead of having to feel the wind from a ceiling fan if you didn't happen to want that all the time.
 
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The previous owner of my house installed floor registers over the stove from the basement to the first floor. With the ceiling fan on pushing cold air down my circular stair case (about 6-7 feet away from the stove), there is a huge column of hot air that comes up the floor registers. That being said he didn't install fire dampers in them. They aren't up to code. It is something I have to fix. However if put a piece of single ply TP over the register it almost shoots to the ceiling if it catches the draft just right.
 
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here is my house layout, with the only way of heat to rise is through the stairway which is in the kitchen blocked by a partition wall, so perhaps cutting a vent through the wall with a little corner fan to blow the heat back into the stove room to either pull the air from the stairway essentially letting warm air travel up or the opposite pulling air from the stove room up the stairs?
 

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I would install the stove first and then determine what changes are necessary after. And you always want to push cold air down towards the stove. You might be surprised at the heat distribution with no radical changes...or you may have to install registers that meet code (well, you don't have to, but you really should). And it is even possible floor registers could not make a big difference.
 
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Charles1981 said:
I would install the stove first and then determine what changes are necessary after. And you always want to push cold air down towards the stove. You might be surprised at the heat distribution with no radical changes...or you may have to install registers that meet code (well, you don't have to, but you really should). And it is even possible floor registers could not make a big difference.
Click to expand...
thanks!
 
leff13 said:
thanks!
Click to expand...
With a P43, the stove room will be quite warm. If you run the ceiling fan in that room it should aid to push warm air through the house. You won't need a large duct over the stove for returning cool air from upstairs. I would try it without that first. I used to have that in my house.when we remodeled they got taken out and really it didn't seem to matter much with blower on the P61. My old coal stove ya, it was radiant only.
 
I've heard on this forum a few times about how cutting holes from the first to second floor could be a fire hazard if a fire starts around the pellet stove on the first floor. Wouldn't a staircase leading upstairs have that effect anyway?- not to mention this is a much larger "hole" than two small vents.
 
Before I moved I had a 2 story house. My pellet stove was in one end of the house and the stairway to go up to the second floor was on the oppsite end. My house was a little over 1700 sq.ft. I never put any type of register in the floors at all. I just the air current in the house do it's own thing. The upstairs was a little cooler then the first floor. But not by much only a couple of degrees. Made it perfect sleeping temp for me. If I sat at the bottom of the stairs I could feel the cooler air coming down the stairs.
 
Legal or not , in most homes where there exists only a single width stairway to the basement pellet stove , floor registers will almost always be needed to effectively move the excess heat out of the basement and up into the first floor. Of course , without floor register (s) some heat will go up the stairway and some cool air underneath will return but it`s minimal compared to what you can do compared to direct heat blowing up thru a floor register (s) and utilizing another register or the stairway for the return of cold air.
I have a return register at the end of a hallway with a fan under the register pulling cold air down into the basement. The stove distribution fan blows the heat out the front and into a 6" flexible aluminum duct up into a register between the living room and kitchen /dining area. I can keep the basement and first floor at even temps all winter long. Some heat goes up the second floor stairway to keep it at 60-62 .
The major point being that you must get the stove`s heat directly up into the main floor and usually the only way to do this is thru the floor.
 
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I have an 1800's house that originally had floor registers to the second floor. Originally when I bought the house it had a Crawford 21 coal "furnace" in the cellar, so the floor registers were likely needed to get heat to the upper most floors. After some assorted renovations the registers were closed up when the hot air oil furnace with duct work to individual rooms was put in. Fast forward to about three years ago and a pellet stove was installed on the first floor. Thought about opening the registers back up, but after using the pellet stove a while, found the upstairs was comfortable without the registers. I do have a stairway that's pretty open to the second floor.
I wouldn't cut in any floor registers before giving it a go without.
My cellar however now sits at about 42 deg F and I wish I had a way to get some heat down there.
 
floor registers == noise

Think long and hard before you chop..
 
I have a bungalow with 1500 sq/ft per floor. The pellet stove is in the basement angled in the corner facing the stairs about 30 ft away. The stove heats the whole basement and roughly 2/3 of the upstairs with only our master bedroom not getting much heat with our door closed (which I like). If you all sleep with your doors open, it should get there. My layout also has some tough corners as yours does also. Although, I should add when I built my house, I built it along the lines of being an R-2000 home.

I have toyed with the idea of floor registers and I'm very glad I didn't, as the stove is in the rec room with the pool table below the master, and I don't think the wife would appreciate the noise of pool, beer, and hockey games :)
 
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If openings between floors is a fire hazard then your staircase would be a GIANT fire hazard .I dont think starcases are against code and i have 2 staircases from the first to the second floor.
 
i.m really thinking about cutting 2 registers in both rooms, one with a product i found online, its a register that has a fan in it to force the cold air down from the bedrooms with the other vent to allow the heat to rise. fire code or not, if my house is on fire i doubt these registers will be my biggest problem as others mentioned i have a staircase which would allow more smoke and heat to rise then a a 6 by 10 floor register
 
Seasoned Oak said:
If openings between floors is a fire hazard then your staircase would be a GIANT fire hazard .I dont think starcases are against code and i have 2 staircases from the first to the second floor.
Click to expand...

With that in mind, the additional openings would increase the spread of things, more smoke etc. In a living room, dining room, kitchen, where the rooms are often open to a stairwell I'd be less worried about a register.

However, I wouldn't consider putting one in a bedroom. Not only could that be a huge turnoff if selling the house in the future, if smoke is in the rest of the house bedroom doors can still be closed and help slow things a bit while a regress window gets used to find safety. With a register in the bedroom, the idea of smoke having an easier path into that sleeping area just doesn't settle well. Also, 'noises' from the bedrooms easily moving to other parts of the house is a turn off.

In all though, a good many people have made these openings and made increased risks just to find that they don't help any. When that happens, it's a real bummer.

We all choose to take risks day in and day out. Always good to have a discussion like this to point out pro-s and con-s so people can make better choices.
 
or do you guys think the stair way will act as a return back to the stove pulling cold air down, im confused on if i should focus on getting cold air down or heat up the stairs?
 
leff13 said:
or do you guys think the stair way will act as a return back to the stove pulling cold air down, im confused on if i should focus on getting cold air down or heat up the stairs?
Click to expand...

Try a small fan to help push the heavy cold air down. The lighter warm air wants to come up and will be aided by the push of cold at the base.
 
pen said:
Try a small fan to help push the heavy cold air down. The lighter warm air wants to come up and will be aided by the push of cold at the base.
Click to expand...
well with the stairway being the only way to get either heat up or down which has the priority? if i push the air down towards to the stove how will hot air get up without registers?
 
cold air goes down next to the stairs, hot air follows up along the head space. Keep the fan low aiming right down the stairs
 
My stairs from the basement run into a foyer. If I want to mess this convection cycle up royally it will happen by turning on the ceiling fan in the foyer.

My stove is at the base of the stairwell and makes it's own loop quite well so I haven't had to use the fan to push cold air here, but many others have reported good success with it.

I like to use the IR temp gun to see the difference in the stairwell. The top is around 20 degrees warmer than the wall down near the steps where the cold air is coming down.
 
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