Wood Stove in Basement or Insert?

Pictures needed.

Pipe heat from stove into central system? If you mean have a cold air intake near the stove, then it won't work. It might help, but it won't be the same.

cnpeele said:

I have a 1500 sq ft two story home with a basement. Right now we are heating with forced air oil. I have been bitten by the wood-burning bug. The cost of oil doesn't help. I am trying to decide between a stove in the basement or an insert on our first floor. Apparently it is ok to pipe heat from a stove into a central air system where I live (Central VA). I have a friend who just did it and the county safety inspector signed off on it. I have two chimneys to work with. My only limitation is the size of the fireplace on the main floor. It is 27" wide in the front, slimming down to 23" in the back. It is 19" deep and 30" tall. From what I have found, this is on the small side for inserts.

We have a staircase that runs up from the basement and the layout downstairs is very open. I would like to be able to have a fire in the main room where we spend a lot of time, but my main concern is heating our house to keep us from using the oil heat. Standalone wood stoves seem readily available where I live, so the basement option is very tempting. Let me know if there is any other information you need.

Thanks for your help.

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Welcome to the forum cnpeele.

Do yourself a huge favor even before you decide on a stove or stoves or insert. Consider the cost of that oil and then consider the cost of wood. Now consider what would happen right now if you bought some bad oil. What would happen to that furnace? Would you be warm in your house?

Poor fuel is the number one enemy of wood burning and new wood burners almost always have that problem. They purchase and install a beautiful stove....and then go looking for the fuel. Please understand that just does not work worth a hoot when burning wood. You can search the forum and you'll find dozens of folks who constantly look for problems with their stoves or their installs and blame the weather and what not, but their problem usually boils down to poor wood.

If you buy wood, every wood seller will tell you it is seasoned wood. That word seasoned is practically meaningless. Fact is, wood has lots of moisture within it and water just doesn't seem to burn very well at all. So time is needed to get rid of some of that water before the wood will burn properly. Without this, the worst thing you'll have is creosote which can cause chimney fires. You'll also fight to get any heat from the stove. Glass in the stove will turn black so you can't even see flame. You'll soon feel terrible because you've spent so many dollars only to find that this wood burning is not what we thought it was.

To burn wood now, most types of wood need a year in the stack and this is a year AFTER it has been cut to length and split. Lots of folks might even say a tree is dead so it is okay to burn. That may or may not be true and usually is not true. Or a tree has been down for two years. Still no good. We had one fellow in our area who bought some tree tops that were left from a logging operation. He sold it has being seasoned 3 years, yet, he cut and split it just before delivery. That was all oak wood too and oak is one of the very best woods you can burn. However, oak is also one of the most contrary woods in that it just does not like to give up its moisture. At our house, we will not burn oak until it has been stacked out in the wind for 3 years after it has been split.

I do not want to scare you or anyone else but only want to point out one of the most basic mistakes. Before you buy a wood burner, make sure you have fuel to burn. Do your research but buy your wood now. In fact, most good wood burners are now cutting their wood that they will be burning in the winter of 2013-2014.

We wish you the very best.

Sage advice. Dennis, sage advice.

Hey Shari, I hope you are keeping warm over there. Any snow? We have too much and would be happy to ship some your way.

Backwoods Savage said:

Hey Shari, I hope you are keeping warm over there. Any snow? We have too much and would be happy to ship some your way.

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No snow yet - it tried last night - weatherman is forecasting 'frizzle' (freezing drizzle).

To the OP's question: I collected (scrounged) firewood for 2 yrs. before I finally got my stove. I hung out at hearth.com asking dummy questions, learning, learning, learning. When I finally got my stove I think a few hearth.com members almost collapsed at my announcement.

We heated with oil 'before', now we heat solely with wood. Our oil furnace still works - we just choose not to use it. Between not purchasing oil and the recent tax credits I figure our stove has already paid for itself in the 1-1/2 yrs. it has been in service. Hubby is happier too as he sits right across from the stove. I suggested moving the furniture around this fall (which would put my seating close to the stove - his away from the stove) and I got an adamant "NO!" from hubby.

As to Dennis' suggestion of getting your wood now: I couldn't agree more. The only way to have truly 'seasoned' wood is to season it yourself. I pushed a little bit the other day and tried some Box Elder that I split/stacked this Spring. I "thought" it looked good (didn't test it on the moisture meter) and stuck some in the stove last night - no go - not good - still too wet. Ah well, I've got around 8 cord sitting here and other wood that has been seasoned 3 yrs. I just wanted to burn up the Box Elder as it doesn't have a very high BTU rating whereas most of my other really, really seasoned wood is shagbark hickory which I'd rather save for those near zero/below zero days.

Again, to the OP: Hang out here, read, read, read - learn, learn, learn. It's easy! We are a GREAT group of people with TONS of knowledge/experience! You will find woodburners who love their inserts and wouldn't go any other way - on the other hand - you will find free standing stove owners (like me) who would not go any other way. You will find (new) woodburners with blowers who panic when they lose power and you will non-blower owners (like me) who simply bask in the heat waves flowing off their stove sans any power all the time. You will find owners who installed burners in the basement who are happy with the heat they get - you will find owners who installed burners in the basement who are not happy with the heat they get. These varying opinions depend on the layout of your home/where you spend most of your time/how far your bedrooms are away from the heat source/how much temperature variance is acceptable to you.

I'm off tangent - let's let others chime in here re: your original questions.

Welcome!

I dumped an oil burner for a heat pump (already had a wood stove). One of the best moves I've made. The internal pump went in the crawlspace and that freed up a bathroom sized room, which became a half bath. The &^%#$ oil heater worked well for what it was, it's just that it also was a stinky dirty messy giant that required his own room. Valued at $100 per sq. ft., plus the cost of oil, my new furnace was "free." Best wishes.

Here's a vote for the basement stove. Keep the mess out of the living room, don't worry about moving hot air; it'll go UP all by itself! No reason you still can't use the fireplace, too. But the best part by far is walking on a warm floor in the morning. Man, it's almost better than chocolate. Do yo ureally need to tie in w/current central heat ducts? Like I said, warm air moves all by itself, duct or no duct.

Keep it simple, do the basement thing! JMHO!

defiant3 said:

Here's a vote for the basement stove. Keep the mess out of the living room, don't worry about moving hot air; it'll go UP all by itself! No reason you still can't use the fireplace, too. But the best part by far is walking on a warm floor in the morning. Man, it's almost better than chocolate. Do yo ureally need to tie in w/current central heat ducts? Like I said, warm air moves all by itself, duct or no duct.

Keep it simple, do the basement thing! JMHO!

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+1- that is how I am heating my house- stove in basement, leave the basement door open, let it rise. You can use small doorway corner fans to move heat around if you need to.

It's going to be tough to heat the whole house from the basement and NOT have the basement uncomfortably warm.

I am assuming it is an unfinished basement- if so, who cares how hot it gets?

I started pouring water onto the concrete floor and using the basement as a sauna

Remkel said:

I am assuming it is an unfinished basement- if so, who cares how hot it gets?

I started pouring water onto the concrete floor and using the basement as a sauna

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"We have a staircase that runs up from the basement and the layout downstairs is very open. I would like to be able to have a fire in the main room where we spend a lot of time, but my main concern is heating our house to keep us from using the oil heat."


I read that as the basement was finished and they spend a lot of time in the main room of the basement. Maybe I misunderstood.

BrowningBAR said:

Remkel said:

I am assuming it is an unfinished basement- if so, who cares how hot it gets?

I started pouring water onto the concrete floor and using the basement as a sauna

Click to expand...

"We have a staircase that runs up from the basement and the layout downstairs is very open. I would like to be able to have a fire in the main room where we spend a lot of time, but my main concern is heating our house to keep us from using the oil heat."


I read that as the basement was finished and they spend a lot of time in the main room of the basement. Maybe I misunderstood.

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Ah, perhaps it is I that is wrong......and perhaps I should have worded it "Hypothetically, if it were unfinished, then who cares how hot it gets?" Did not mean to come across poorly.

Remkel said:

BrowningBAR said:

Remkel said:

I am assuming it is an unfinished basement- if so, who cares how hot it gets?

I started pouring water onto the concrete floor and using the basement as a sauna

Click to expand...

"We have a staircase that runs up from the basement and the layout downstairs is very open. I would like to be able to have a fire in the main room where we spend a lot of time, but my main concern is heating our house to keep us from using the oil heat."


I read that as the basement was finished and they spend a lot of time in the main room of the basement. Maybe I misunderstood.

Click to expand...

Ah, perhaps it is I that is wrong......and perhaps I should have worded it "Hypothetically, if it were unfinished, then who cares how hot it gets?" Did not mean to come across poorly.

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Oh, no, not at all. I was just letting you know why I posted my concern.

My stove is in the basement.
Very happy I moved it there from the living room.
Wood door to bring in the wood saves a mess.
Happy with the heat in the rest of the house but the basement area is warmer when I have the stove cranking on cold days.
On cold days, nice to go down & warm up

+1 also on basement install over the living room.
Being very a open staircase, some heat will move up & cool air down & you may feel a cool air breeze in the stairway.
My forced air fan kicks on 3 times per hour for a few minutes & helps move some air around the house.
Either will save $$money.
Basement heat, when the power is out, will keep the whole house warmer than if it was in the up stairs area. Heat is hard to move down

PS: Start getting wood now, it takes a year minimum to dry & burn well

If you have a large enough unobstructed opening in the stairwell, then, the basement position can work very well for whole house heating. If you have a framed in doorway between the main level and the basement, you can kiss that dream away. Even with the door open there will be way too much restriction. The only way for the basement heating to work up a stairwell is if there are absolutely no "flanges" or "doorways" obstructing the flow of warm air. ideally speaking, there should be a sudden rise in the stairwell that matches the level of the ceiling in the main house. Such a configuration will maximize natural convection through the house. If you have bedrooms in hallways on the main level, you may find that you need to open the area above the door frame in order for heat to migrate into those rooms.

Eric

Remkel said:

I am assuming it is an unfinished basement- if so, who cares how hot it gets?

I started pouring water onto the concrete floor and using the basement as a sauna

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A good reason is the fact you will use 2x the wood you would need if the stove was in the living space. Most of the heat will go into heating the concrete walls down there.

mdocod said:

If you have a large enough unobstructed opening in the stairwell, then, the basement position can work very well for whole house heating. If you have a framed in doorway between the main level and the basement, you can kiss that dream away. Even with the door open there will be way too much restriction. The only way for the basement heating to work up a stairwell is if there are absolutely no "flanges" or "doorways" obstructing the flow of warm air. ideally speaking, there should be a sudden rise in the stairwell that matches the level of the ceiling in the main house. Such a configuration will maximize natural convection through the house. If you have bedrooms in hallways on the main level, you may find that you need to open the area above the door frame in order for heat to migrate into those rooms.

Eric

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My stairway to the basement has a framed doorway- kitchen was 81 degrees yesterday. Also grew up in a house heated in the same manner. The heat will find it's way up.

cnpeele said:

Thanks for the advice so far. It is a good thing this decision process is taking a while, because there is a lot to consider, especially having quality fuel. I have attached a picture of the fireplace. To answer another question, the basement is not finished, is used only for storage, a workshop, and laundry. The ceilings are about 6 foot 5 inches, so we will likely never finish it. The basement walls are probably 70% under ground level

If I were to go with the stove in the basement, how important is the proximity of the stove to the stairway leading up?

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My stove is approximately 21' from the stairway (this is because that is where the chimney is). It takes a little to get the basement up to heat, but once it is, the heat moves up. Your having such low ceilings will only help to reduce the time to heat the basement. As for the concrete heat sink, what I find is once the concrete gets heated, should the fire go out for a while, I still have heat rising up through the house.

The other thing I am considering is building a divider wall in the basement, cutting the basement in half to force more hot air upstairs- but with the heat I am getting right now, I think this may drive us out of the house. I will see how everything perform once the really cold weather arrives (we have only gotten down to 21 degrees at night so far- still relatively warm).

Good luck whichever way you decide to go. I can only relate my experience with the basement install (which has been great so far).

Heating the basement to 85-90* is a beautiful thing. The heat radiates through the flooring and keeps the main floor comfortable. I help the convection with an inline fan attached to the end of the cold air return run which brings down cool air from the main floor. Works great!

cnpeele said:

Apparently it is ok to pipe heat from a stove into a central air system where I live (Central VA)..

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I'm not understanding why everyone is talking about the heat floating up the stairwell when he has a forced hot air system he can pump heat into. My father heated a 2800 square foot house this way using a woodchuck furnace for 20 years. It worked very well burning six cord a year. He kept the basement door shut. The furnace warmed the basement enough to make it comfortable. The basement was a walk in so he stored the wood under a deck and brought in a wheelbarrow load every day or so. I think you should go with this setup and use the fireplace for ambiance.