Advice on warming the furthest rooms in house (additional stove? heat registers?)

Hi All,

This site has been an amazing resource for me getting up and running with my first pellet stove.

My Enviro EF3 is heating my entire home but my bedrooms are the furthest from the stove and remain on the cool side. With a baby on the way, I want to ensure that I am getting those rooms warm enough for next season.

I have a split level with a mostly finished basement. The EF3 is in the finished basement and depending on the temp outside, I keep the area in the low to mid 70's. Without the use of any fans, the upstairs generally maintains temps in the low 60's. There is a small staircase that leads up to an open kitchen/living room/dining room with no walls and vaulted ceilings.

To the other side of the staircase is a hallway that leads to the bathrooms and three bedrooms. The thermostat is installed in the hallway before these rooms and right before the attic stairs where I seem to lose a bit of hot air. I'm finding that my bedrooms run a few degrees cooler at times than the area with the thermostat. I'm concerned that on very cold days, the baby's room will not be warm enough. Because the thermostat does not reside in the same area as the bedrooms, it is harder to run supplemental oil heat. I'd have to drive the temps into the 70's to force the heat to kick on.

So, I'm looking for solutions and hoping for a bit of guidance. Here are some of my ideas:


1. Install an attic tent. - This one seems like a no-brainer to me. I can install it myself, it is cheap and I can tell the difference in temp before and after the attic stairs. I assume I'm losing a bit of heat here. While I'm sure this will help, I'm not sure that it is going to completely solve my problem.

2. Move the thermostat - This would make it easier to effectively run the oil heat as a secondary heat source. The major hurdle is that I have no idea how to do this myself, so I'm not sure what the associated costs would be. I'd also be relying on oil a bit more.

3. Install heat registers in the bedrooms - The result that I'd be looking for is to equalize the hot air in the basement with the cooler air upstairs, rendering both areas more comfortable. My concerns are not knowing how effective the air transfer will be with one register in each bedroom, not knowing if the heat transfer will be hindered by the drop ceiling in the basement and then not knowing the costs to install three registers. I assume the hardware would be reasonable and if I can find a capable friend, handyman, it shouldn't be too difficult. Does anyone have any experience in attempting this?

4. Add another pellet stove upstairs - I have a fireplace upstairs that would look great with an insert. As I am not a do-it-yourselfer, the upfront costs to install another pellet stove are high-ish. I'm also concerned about the additional pellet usage and the overall fuel costs. And just to be picky, I'd have another stove to clean. I estimate that I spend five to six hours a week on the EF3 and I really wouldn't want to double that.


So, if you are still reading my long-winded post...THANK YOU! I'd love to get some input on how I can get my bedrooms warmer! Thank you in advance!

Our house is a single level ranch, so the layout is different, but the principle is similar. The stove is at one end of the house, and the bedrooms are at the opposite end. I moved the thermostat for the FHA oil furnace to our bedroom and shut the valves in the ductwork for the FHA to the rest of the house, excepting the 3 bedrooms. At night we can close the bedroom doors without worrying about freezing, and it looks like a half a tank of oil will last a few years. Having a programmable thermostat for the furnace helps.

I live in a raised ranch with a similar setup. I started with a pellet stove on a hearth at the north end of the house on the lower level. After almost a year I ended up installing another stove upstairs at the opposite end of the house. Now the house is evenly heated throughout, and I honestly don't think my pellet usage went up over 20-25%. With one stove, it was running constantly and now it runs less than 50% of the time in cold weather. The upstairs stove runs even less, and is helped out a lot by the sun's warmth. Total consumption last winter was just over 4 tons. Should be just over that this winter. At $223 a ton, both stoves will be paid for in under 4 heating seasons.
As far as time spent, my stoves are both Enviro Empress models, and I clean them every other day during the winter. It takes about 5-7 minutes per stove, or less than an hour per week. I do a major cleaning including the exhaust fan and behind the inner panels twice a year, which takes about 30-45 minutes per stove. I use a Cheeteh II ash vac.

Thats an excellent idea.

I'm a newbie with an accentra insert. I also updated my oil heat system (rehabbing the whole house). I decided to spend a little extra to get a wireless thermostat for the main house zone. I have a 3 story house so I figured I could place the thermostat on the 2F or 3F and shut the radiators down for the 1F room with the pellet stove. Because it's wireless I can move it around and try different locations. This allows me to use a combination of the two systems for maximum comfort - particularly in real cold weather. So in your instance I would try moving the thermostat and consider a wireless thermostat because it gives you lots of options for locating it. Good luck!

A wireless thermostat for a furnace? Where did you get that? I would imagine the base unit is on the wall, right?

Regarding my wireless T-stat: The system is a hot water boiler. The T-stat is wherever I put it. It relays the call for heat to a base unit which is attached to the boiler itself -- and tied to a relay switch to trigger the circulator for that zone. It's a honeywell. T8665A Chronotherm IV Wireless Thermostat. It was a little pricey through the oil dealer. But maybe worth a look.

Thanks for all the advice all!

I didn't know that they made wireless t-stats but I'm finding some more info on Google. Adding one to the Baby's room seems like it may be the way to go for me.

Once money isn't as much of an issue, I definitely do want to add an insert for the fireplace though.