Moving air past these openings

wahoowad · Feb 9, 2006

This is the room where I have my woodstove. It is a long room with a cathedral ceiling and maybe +300 sq. feet. I have a ceiling fan up there which does great for that room. The cathedral ceiling and walls really trap the heat just in this room and it is starting to get near tropical during my evening burns. The difference is like night and day when you walk through that doorway - like walking outside!

I can feel some cold air coming into the room at the lower part of the doorway and am sure some air is flowing out through the top of that kitchen window and the doorway. But it's as if no heat is really getting out there. I'd like to force more cold air into that room (which should force more heated air out of the room) but don't want to block the doorway with a floor fan. Plus, my floor fan is a beast and the noise/blast would be a nuisance. And my cats would hate a noisy fan and avoid that room, which I would like to avoid (and like the cats so don't go there!)

Anybody know of a quiet fan? I'm eyeballing these tower fans online but have never seen one in operation. They seem slim, stand up off the floor a bit, and might not impede travel in/out the room. I know they make those corner fans but my goal is to move the cold air in and so I need a fan near the floor.

wahoowad · Feb 9, 2006

here's the "tower fan"

Sandor · Feb 10, 2006

Now you know why these big ceilings are usually heating disasters.

Question is..... is the ceiling in the kitchen through the doorway a cethedral also? If so, cut it out and make a nice triangular open window.

There is no pathway for the hot air to move in and displace the cold air to make it move toward the stove.

The fan will do nothing in your case.

Corey · Feb 10, 2006

I feel your pain. I used to have a house with a tall ceiling in the same room as the stove. There are basically two options. Let the air go ahead and stratify - if you have some method to pull the super hot air off the ceiling and distribute it to the rest of the house. This works almost like a furnace. If you don't have that option, crank the ceiling fan to really mix up the air and blow air between the two rooms.

As far as the fans, I have only seen one tower fan and it sounded like a hairdryer. Just looking at the design, it seems like they would be noisy. They are basically a small fan turning very fast to move air. That always equates to noise. In general, a large fan moving slowly will move the most air with the least noise. It's out of season, but sometimes the bigger stores have displays set up so you can listen to and evaluate the fans. May have to wait till spring for that one, though!

Good Luck
Corey

wahoowad · Feb 10, 2006

No, the kitchen ceiling is not as high so a cutout will not work.

I do think cold air comes in at the base of the door and warm air flows out the top of the opening to the kitchen. I can feel the cold air flowing into the room, I'm just hoping to assist this process. I bought a small box fan, about 1/4 the size of a normal floor fan and placed it in the doorway. It moves a surprising amount of air, even on low where it is quiet. I'm thinking it will help a lot. I guess I just need to decide if I think the warm air flowing into the rest of my house will actually warm it up a noticable amount.

saichele · Feb 10, 2006

They're not terrifically attractive, but for about $20 you can get a 4" cooling fan to hang on a cuphook in the corner of the doorway. I got one of the 'entreair' fancy ones, but the thing is so loud we don;t use it much. The smaller ones are pretty effective. Also try running your ceiling fan in the opposite direction. We'd been running our drawing air up (like the CW says) but it always felt drafty. We switched it back to 'down' and found it does a much better job of distributing the warm air from the top of the room.

Steve

carpniels · Feb 10, 2006

He wahoo,

I feel your pain. I have been playing with my fans the entire season to get the heat distributed the best.

Tower fans s*ck. Don't bother. The best fan I have tried is a Vornado. Make a long tunnel of warm air frm your room all the way down the hallway. They sell a pedistal version too.

My stove shop has these corner-of -the-door fans. They look like a fan that sits in a computer, but they blow 100 cfm and they are 100% quiet. $30 but worth it. Another option is a in wall fan. They sell them where you cut a 6 inch hole in the wall, put the fan in and plug it in. It blows at 2 speeds, make a little noise but looks nice and works like a dream above your door opening. Check it out. About $90.

I am only blowing the hot air out. I tried cold air in, 2 fans (high one warm air, low one cold air in the other direction), but this seems to work the best.

I have hear of cutting holes in the sheetrock and finishing it off as if it is a door opening. Basically you are creating horizontal registers. That seems to work best in old homes with many smaller rooms like mine. All hot air stops at the doorways. The fans are a temporary solution for now.

Good Luck

Carpniels

wahoowad · Feb 10, 2006

Looks like we will finally get some snow and sustained cold weather this weekend - I'll be burning all weekend long and toying with the fans!

Scraper · Feb 11, 2006

You'd be surprised how well those corner fans will work. I use them in my home that has vaulted ceilings much like yours to push heat around.

drizler · Feb 11, 2006

For a nice cheap fan try one of those little 10" square Hauer fans. I got mine last year and ran it all last winter and this one in the hallway on the floor. Its the quietest one I have seen and it seems to move the air enough. Best of all its cheap and soft enough that when you fall over it neither of you will get hurt. I got mine either at Wallyworld or Lowes. It puts out about half the racket of one of those pricy corner fans which I found to be too loud. That little Hauer finally bit the dust last week so I tore it down cleaned the dirty dust from it and separated the motor pieces. A little toothbrush action and 2 drops of oil and its as good as new. I was pretty impressed with the quality of the motor. It was even bolted together so it would come apart. I could hardly believe it. I suppose the same goes for other fans as well. If it stops working take a few minutes to clean it and you might be surprised. That dust and animal hair seems to weave a web to simply bog it down to a halt.

wahoowad · Feb 11, 2006

Driz, that might be the fan I actually bought. Mine is basically a miniature box-style floor fan. it is about 12" x 12" and is quiet and moves a lot of air. I assume all the cold air it blows in to the room at floor level must displace other air and that means warmed air flowing out the top of the door and kitchen thing. I tried to feel the warm air escaping but just am not sure I feel it. But it has to be rollin out with all that cool air I am forcing in.

begreen · Feb 11, 2006

What is in the space that is over the kitchen? Is that an attic area? If yes, perhaps a ducted fan that has an intake grille at the peak of the cathedral wall and outputs into the kitchen ceiling or further down the way might help? It would take a little fabrication, but you could make a temporary enclosure to test it.

CrazyAboutOrchids · Feb 11, 2006

Your set up is similar to mine, but you have an extra opening with your room. Last year I used my furnace fan with pretty good success so long as I started it early on so I wasn't blowing cold air in the room. My intakes are in the ceiling of the room and returns on the floor so it worked well for me. However, I don't really like having the furnace fan running all the time particularly since our electric rates in CT have skyrocketed.

Last year I tried this fan:
http://www.northlineexpress.com/detail~PRODUCT_ID~5MM-F-10.asp

And then this:
http://www.plowhearth.com/product.a...&cm_val=&cm_pos=&cur_index=&cm_type=&pcode=78

Before settling on this:
http://www.northlineexpress.com/detail~PRODUCT_ID~5CO-71925.asp

I have light colored walls and did not want the black as I figured it would stick out like a sore thumb. However it is silent where the other two are not. After using it all this season, I don't even notice the black any more. Shop around, I got mine for much less off Ebay. Still have the other two sitting here if you want to try one or both, but if you are looking for quiet, they aren't the fan for you. I like to watch the news from my tv in the family room as I cook in my kitchen and with both of the other fans, I couldn't hear the tv unless I blasted it. Highly recommend the black fan is you like quiet. And it's amazing how much heat that little thing can move around the house, all in mostly complete silence.

begreen · Feb 11, 2006

I used the Radio Shack variety of this muffin fan for several years. It's not whisper silent, but compared to the Plow and Hearth corner fan, it's much quieter. I hooked it up to some white lamp cord with an inline lamp switch and painted it with some white spray paint so that it didn't stand out. Or, if you have a local electronics supplier or a surplus house, look for 120 vac, 4" axial (aka muffin) fans. Pabst makes some nice, quiet ones.

http://www.radioshack.com/product/index.jsp?productId=2102823&kw=2102823
http://www.grainger.com/Grainger/wwg/itemDetailsRender.shtml?xi=xi&ItemId=1611724460&ccitem=

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Moving air past these openings

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