Am I the only one with too much heat?

[andybaker]

Hey all,
I'm wondering if anyone has figured out how to burn to get less heat? This winter I've tried burning just two logs at a time and still the family room gets so hot it's hard to stay in there without opeining the window. I do have a fan running in some duct work to carry some of the heat upstairs but it's not enough to cool the room down.

 

[begreen]

How large is the family room and how open is this room to the rest of the house?

One thing you could try is to take a regular table or box fan and set it on the floor. Blow air from a cooler part of the house into the stove room. That will help even out the heat.

 

[StihlHead]

Use low BTU, shoulder season wood like cedar, pine, or cottonwood and you will get less heat. We have had warm weather here this week and I have been burning pine and white cedar. Also damp it down sooner.

 

[eclecticcottage]

We have that happen some times in shoulder season. Like previously stated, try lower btu faster burning woods like willow, etc and burn smaller pieces with longer times between reloads. We oversized our stove so it's been a learning process. Be sure not to damp down so much that your smoldering your fire and building creosote though, which can be easy to do when trying to limit the amount of heat.

(we are burning scotch pine right now, and it's 18 degrees out/75 inside. I don't know that pine is the answer if it's too hot...)

 

[andybaker]

When it was warmer out I did use a lower grade wood. I was burning Silver Maple, then I moved to a stack I had a lot of Basswood in it mixed with White Ash. I burned the Bass on the warmer days. Now it's colder out, right now it's 8, and all I have now is Red Oak and Hickory. I'll burn two pieces and I cut off most the air supply. They burn down in about two hours and leave a bed of coals I can let sit for almost two more hours before adding more. By the end of the day it's so warm in there it's hard to sit and watch TV. The room is 13 feet wide with a large bay window not far from the fire and the room is our family room, dinning area and then kitchen so it's about 40' long and there is one opening to the rest of the house that leads to an open area with stairs which leads to a landing and on to the bedrooms. I cut a hole in ceiling of the dinning area and put a grate and a hole through the floor upstairs and put a floor grate there. In between I have small 8" fan I run almost constantly pushing air up. If I stand on the grate up stairs in my socks you can feel the nice warmth flowing all the way up to my face. I'm wondering if these newer EPA units just burn too clean. I clean the chimney once a year and get maybe enough stuff brushed down to half fill a ball cap, and that's a 25' chimney. The basement is freezing because the furnace doesn't come on much. Be nice to get some of that heat down there. I like the idea using the box fan. Moving cold air pushing it into the warm area forcing that air to balanced hopefully with warm air from the warm room. I'll think about that one experiment some.

 

[lopiliberty]

Is a constant temperature of 85 to 90 degrees considered to much heat?

 

[andybaker]

Yes I would say so How about 75 - 80. I am more of a warm blooded guy, maybe that's the problem. Yesterday I loaded the wood stack by the house and cleared away the new snow. It never got over 22 during the day and by the time I was done it was well into the teens outside. All I wore the whole time was a pull over sweat shirt and never got cold.

 

[topoftheriver]

Is a constant temperature of 85 to 90 degrees considered to much heat?

I use fans to circulate the cold air down to the stove and the warmer air drafts up automatically. I find it works better than trying to circulate the warm air. But I wouldn't worry much by the 85+ degrees because it cools down faster enough. Too hot, dampen the fire and make the wood last longer.

 

[PapaDave]

I'll think about that one experiment some.​

Not an experiment. Many here do that (I'm one of 'em), and it works great.
The experiment is finding the right spot for the fan.

 

[Hogwildz]

Use larger splits.

 

[wkpoor]

My 100,000btu gas furnace couldn't get my house as warm as some of you say your stove does for you. Man there must be some mighty powerful stoves out there heheheh.

 

[corey21]

Yeah i have that problem. Last night it hit 83 in here with the bed time load.

 

[ArsenalDon]

Use larger splits.

Hog is right....those saying smaller splits and less of them are wrong...smaller splits leave more room for air between...larger splits and a fully loaded stove packed tight create a more even easier to control burn.

 

[Hogwildz]

Even a couple large, and I mean LARGE, splits always does the trick for me in the shoulder seasons.
There is no right or wrong way for every case. I can only speak for what works here with my set up.

 

[topoftheriver]

Even a couple large, and I mean LARGE, splits always does the trick for me in the shoulder seasons.
There is no right or wrong way for every case. I can only speak for what works here with my set up.

I'm with you, Hog. They last longer too.

 

[Hogwildz]

You must make sure they are truly dry though, or they will smolder bigtime if not.

 

[begreen]

The Kozy Z42 is a large and serious heater. It could be too large for the house, especially if the home is well insulated. Or it could be that the heat from the fireplace needs better distribution. What is the total sq ftg of the house? Are the two heat ducts coming off the Kozy piped or blocked? If they are piped, where are they ducted to? It sounds like you could benefit from one being ducted into the basement.

As a test, try reversing the 8" fan to blow cool air down into the room for a day or two and see if that helps. And try the box fan idea with the fan set in the adjacent open area blowing cooler air toward the fireplace and see if that helps. Or perhaps just cycle the furnace's fan on (without the burner) maybe 15 minutes every hour to get the warm air circulating throughout the house and open up a supply register in the basement if there is one.

 

[andybaker]

Good ideas everyone, thanks. I agree with the larger splits. The last couple years I've been doing small splits hoping to calm it down somewhat but just this weekend I'm getting back into some dry seasoned large splits to play with just what your talking about Hog. The only thing I don't like about the Z42 is there is not much clearance for super large splits but then again, if there were I would load it up and still complain The sq, footage of the house is 2200 sq. ft not including a full basement. The two ducts are blocked off not being used. I thought the room above the fireplace room would roast my daughter out of there. I read that I couldn't pipe the heat downward so I stopped thinking about that one. But that is exactly what I'd like to do, my computer is in the basement so I go from the hot room upstairs and cool down writing here in a freezing basement, LOL. I just put a box fan in the opening of the hallway facing the family room. If that does the trick and it's that easy I'm going in for a brain check.

 

[Coog]

The Kozy Z42 is a large and serious heater. It could be too large for the house, especially if the home is well insulated. Or it could be that the heat from the fireplace needs better distribution. What is the total sq ftg of the house? Are the two heat ducts coming off the Kozy piped or blocked? If they are piped, where are they ducted to? It sounds like you could benefit from one being ducted into the basement.

As a test, try reversing the 8" fan to blow cool air down into the room for a day or two and see if that helps. And try the box fan idea with the fan set in the adjacent open area blowing cooler air toward the fireplace and see if that helps. Or perhaps just cycle the furnace's fan on (without the burner) maybe 15 minutes every hour to get the warm air circulating throughout the house and open up a supply register in the basement if there is one.

I'm with begreen on running the furnace fan. That should distribute the heat during the hottest burn times.

 

[gmule]

My 100,000btu gas furnace couldn't get my house as warm as some of you say your stove does for you. Man there must be some mighty powerful stoves out there heheheh.

Yes there are

100% wood heat so far this winter

 

[pen]

Jeez, a baker that can't take the heat

pen

 

[andybaker]

Pen More like tired of the heat. And already tired of making Paczki!!

 

[corey21]

My house is about 80 right now.

 

[pen]

Pen More like tired of the heat. And already tired of making Paczki!!

I know the feeling, I don't like it cold but don't like it hot either. If the house is more than 74, I'm (we're) unhappy.

Keep us posted as you experiment.

pen

 

[corey21]

I know the feeling, I don't like it cold but don't like it hot either. If the house is more than 74, I'm (we're) unhappy.

Keep us posted as you experiment.

pen

My house stays above 74 with the stove running we get hot if it hits 85.