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DorazioJ

New Member
Jan 12, 2011
21
Western Ma
I'm late to the Pellet Party but I am having an M55 Cast insert installed next week. Very excited. Trying to stay on top of all the little issues I see people posting about the stove. It's a new model so I can understand there may be a few kinks to work out. Lot of money so i'm hoping it does a good job heating my home. I have a 2400 sq ft colonial.. stove will be located in our living room which is over the garage but open to most of the house. Question: has anyone used a room to room fan to try to move hot air between rooms for better airflow? If so any recommended brands?
 
Congrats on the new stove. Post some pics when its installed and BURNING!!

I use three fans in my very open 2500sqft colonial, 2 are doorway fans and 1 is a 12" table fan on the floor. Believe it or not, the table fan is by far the most important. More on that after.

We purchased 2 EntreeAIR doorway fans from home depot. They are ok. A little loud, but they do move quite a bit of air, they look good and stay up out out of the way. We use one in the opening to the living room and one on the second floor in our bedroom doorway. However, one died after about 6 weeks. It wasn't running continuously, but it was running alot. Got a replacement from HD, but before I did, I picked up a new one at my local True Value. It is black, metal construction, chrome grate and a long cord. It is quieter, moves MORE air, but doesn't look great. Basically, I love it, my wife doesn't. It is made by MinuteMan / Achla Designs.

More importantly is the table fan on the floor that I am using to push cold air back towards the stove to try and help with convection. When the door fan was down, the 'cold air return' fan still kept a pretty good circulation going.
 
I to use the Entreeair corner fans. They do a great job at equalizing the temps in the bedroom. We run 2 ceiling fans, one in the kitchen and the other in the Dining room (pellet stove room-middle of our ranch). With ceiling fans on low 24/7, humidifier on Med 24/7, and Entreeair fans on (only while sleeping). Our 2,180 sq ft ranch stays within 3-4 degrees. Getting the air moving right for you may take a little time and tweaking.
(Entreeair also makes a thru the wall fan) moves more air - much more pricey than corner unit.
 

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Oh yeah... AND... Congrats on the new stove. Welcome to the forum. Keep us updated, and show us some pics once you get it installed.
 
Thanks for the info.. and the quick feedback.. very useful tool this forum is. Those corner units look like a good inexpensive alternative.. could be good for the upstairs bedroom, I was thinking more about a thru the wall unit from our living room because it doesn't have a traditional doorway.. it is open to the kitchen. My concern is how efficiently the heat will turn the corners. a thru the wall fan might work better. Do you know anyone who has put a through the wall fan thru a ceiling into an upstairs room or hallway to quickly move heat upstairs? the stove is 55k btu so I maybe overthinking this but I'd like to have this bad boy heat the house with limited reliance on my furnace if possible.

And I will certainly post some pics once it's up and running. I picked up 30 of the $3.74 bags of stove chow pellets based on the reviews on this forum to get me going.
 
Can't help with the through-the-wall fan, but I can tell you that at our lake house, we had a 14x14 register over our wood stove that went straight through the ceiling and there was a floor register in the bedroom, no duct work or anything, the space was just boxed off. It was the only way to effectively get heat up there and it worked pretty well, no fan needed, though it was, like I said, directly over the wood stove.

Keep in mind that any opening beween floors may be a violation of fire code, depending on where you are, how old the house is, etc, etc.....
 
Ok.. thanks. Once I get it I'll check the heat flow and mess around with the fan set up. Going to try to avoid going through the ceiling especially if it is a code issue.
 
Its been done for years, so if thats what you have to do for heat, then thats what you have to do. I wouldn't loose any sleep over it.
 
Getting the heat up and around may prove to be tricky, and as stated before check with local codes and regulations. What type of furnace do you have? And is there a/any cold air returns near your stove? I know some people who just cycle there blower on the furnace to "move" the air in there house. Works for some, but not most applications. Again, good luck. You came to the right place for help. Burn burning for a few years now and just found this forum a few months ago!! Wish I knew sooner!! (Jealous) Not gonna say I didn't have my fair amount of issues with "BAD PELLETS" Air movement, etc.. Through Trial and Error is where I have learned the most. I have now read and searched almost every problem I have had. Could have saved a lot of time had I known about this site. But I'm here now and can ENJOY my beverages while relaxing and NOT pulling my hair out.
 
Welcome m55 cast man,

I used a Suncourt TW108 thru the wall fan, picked it up at the local hardware store.

More info here
 

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I have a forced air furnace, there are returns near the stove so I could just run the furnace fan.. I was concerned that by the time the air circluated through the duck work I'd lose the heat..
J - thanks for that link.. that type of thru the wall unit was what I was thinking about. Did you hard wire it or do you have it plugged in?
 
m55 cast man said:
J - thanks for that link.. that type of thru the wall unit was what I was thinking about. Did you hard wire it or do you have it plugged in?

I installed it right near an outlet so I just plugged it in. You could install a longer cord if need be. Or with some though you might be able to hard wire it.
 
We have a ceiling fan in the room where the stove is installed. It makes a big difference. Thinking about installing a through wall fan. We have apox 3200 sq feet and use the stove to primarily heat the downstairs. It will take the edge (and hvac load) off the upstairs.

Keep in mind, yes the stove will crank out the BTU's...it will also consume lots of pellets on the higher settings. There are some smart folks here who have tweeked the M55 settings pretty well. I suggest searching M55.
 
Depending on the money you have to spend, you could buy a pellet furnace. I just purchased one off of craigslist. Only used last year, got a SUPER deal. Yeah its used, but it cost about 1/3-1/4 total cost if new. Then just duct it in to existing HVAC. Just a thought.
 
Jay,are you using that fan to push cold air to the stove or to push the warm air to other parts of the house
 
DexterDay said:
I to use the Entreeair corner fans. They do a great job at equalizing the temps in the bedroom. We run 2 ceiling fans, one in the kitchen and the other in the Dining room (pellet stove room-middle of our ranch). With ceiling fans on low 24/7, humidifier on Med 24/7, and Entreeair fans on (only while sleeping). Our 2,180 sq ft ranch stays within 3-4 degrees. Getting the air moving right for you may take a little time and tweaking.
(Entreeair also makes a thru the wall fan) moves more air - much more pricey than corner unit.
We went to HD and bought several of these fans thinking it would be the answer to moving the air around. I put one up and had to take it down. The noise was just too much and so was the draft. We can run the ceiling fans and not hear a thing. The winter mode helps lessen any feeling of a draft. There are "muffin" fans which are much the same as the ones that cool a desk top computer. They are available for the same type of installation and are very quiet. A small fan now sits at the base of the stair blowing air towards the stove. No one sits in the path of that fan. Usually that is all we need. In the extreme cold as we had these past few days, our furnace kicks in and forces the air to even out. With only the two of us here now, I can shut some of the rooms off and not concerns myself about keeping them warm. Our open areas stay the warmest and most comfortable.
 
save$ said:
DexterDay said:
I to use the Entreeair corner fans. They do a great job at equalizing the temps in the bedroom. We run 2 ceiling fans, one in the kitchen and the other in the Dining room (pellet stove room-middle of our ranch). With ceiling fans on low 24/7, humidifier on Med 24/7, and Entreeair fans on (only while sleeping). Our 2,180 sq ft ranch stays within 3-4 degrees. Getting the air moving right for you may take a little time and tweaking.
(Entreeair also makes a thru the wall fan) moves more air - much more pricey than corner unit.
We went to HD and bought several of these fans thinking it would be the answer to moving the air around. I put one up and had to take it down. The noise was just too much and so was the draft. We can run the ceiling fans and not hear a thing. The winter mode helps lessen any feeling of a draft. There are "muffin" fans which are much the same as the ones that cool a desk top computer. They are available for the same type of installation and are very quiet. A small fan now sits at the base of the stair blowing air towards the stove. No one sits in the path of that fan. Usually that is all we need. In the extreme cold as we had these past few days, our furnace kicks in and forces the air to even out. With only the two of us here now, I can shut some of the rooms off and not concerns myself about keeping them warm. Our open areas stay the warmest and most comfortable.

Yes they are loud, but until we got them we used our ceiling fan in our room on high. (Ceiling fan is still quieter). I more less used it for the noise, but the temp was almost 7 degrees cooler with ceiling fan. The Entreeair is loud. But the warm air it pushes in the room at the top, forces the cold air out at the bottom. Keeping the room only 4 degrees different on the coldest of nights. There not the perfect answer. I have seen better. But they were cheap, and most important, they work. I will choose function over form. I found the thru the wall one after purchasing these. Wish I would have waited. It was an impulse buy.. To each there own.
 
My master bed room has 15' vaulted ceiling and stays about 6-7 degrees cooler than the rest of the house with the ceiling fan on also. 30mins before I go to bed I turn on a desk fan on the floor in the bedroom doorway. Bye the time i go to bed it is with in 1-2 degrees as the rest of house and stays like that all night. Cold air moves easier than hot.

I would also like to know if J-T uses his through the wall high or low?
 
corkman said:
Jay,are you using that fan to push cold air to the stove or to push the warm air to other parts of the house
I don't use it anymore since I have the stove now ducted to every room. But I used it to move the warm air into one room.

bigdaddyste said:
I would also like to know if J-T uses his through the wall high or low?

I mostly used low. High was noisy and the wifey complained of feeling the draft. A fan with even warm air behind it feels cool when its blowing on you. I placed a magazine rack in front of it to defuse the air/draft effect.

It will be coming out of the wall as soon as I am sure the ducting adventure paid off.
 
Congrats to OP on the new purchase. Wish I had one :)

For moving air around my place I use this 4" Muffin type fan.
I bought it a stove shop years ago for around $40.00 (Outrageous, but I was tired of web shopping)

Brand is Imperial. Called General Purpose Fan. (sound efficient) http://imperialgroup.ca looks like about a 4"size
Comes with mounting bracket, 12’ cord with in-line switch
Rating label says:
3000RPM, 110VAC, 60 cycles, 22watt, .24A, 105CFM at free flow.

Thing originally was in the top corner of the wall opening between my Kitchen and the Living Room (stove room).
I had it blowing warmed air into the kitchen.

A few years ago I moved it to just above floor level and blow the cooler air back into the stove room.

I noticed a big improvement with how the house heat was balanced throughout the house.

Mine runs from October-May.

About once a week I vacuum the grills to remove the dog hair.

I'm not sure if it can still be found. I searched their site but it seems to be missing now.
The specs should get you close with a different manufacturer.

Good Luck,
---Nailer---
 
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