Heating other Rooms in the House

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joescho

Feeling the Heat
Feb 11, 2009
391
Northeastern PA
Hello Everyone:

Got a question on heating my other rooms in my house with my pellet stove. This weekend it got pretty chilly/rainy so I decided to fire up the pellet stove just to take the chill out of the house. I have a ranch house with the pellet stove in the living room, a kitchen off that room, and then a hallway leading to bedrooms. The hallway is reletively short, about 13 feet. Anyway, I have the Mt. Vernon which has the thermostat which is mounted to the ajacent wall about 6 or 7 feel away. I've got a cheap box fan pointing down the hallway running in an attempt to push the heat down the hallway. I've got to say this thing really shoots out the heat. My question is how can I push at least some of this heat down the hallway without roasting myself in the process? The fan does not seem to do a whole lot. Will the heat naturally find its way down the hall after a while? It would be nice to be able to run the stove without having the thermostat want to keep shutting it down ( at least running it on low). This may give the heat a greater chance to find its way throughout the house, but I think I may roast myself in the process.


Thanks....
 
Cold air, finds hot air easier.. Put the fan by the bedrooms and push the cold air towards the hot air.. The warm air will fill in the cold air you are pushing at the stove..

I also use little corner door fans made bt Entreeair and Minuteman...They help equalize the temps in my 70 ft long Ranch.........
 
Thats the ticket.

We have a Ranch style layout with one Large pellet stove in the Family room, a small pellet stove at the far end of the house in the Living room and another very large Pellet stove in the farthest corner of the living room.

The use of the stoves is based on the temperature outside. When the outdoor temps fall below about 50 the large stove in the family room handles the chores. During recent days its been
"Cool and damp" with temps in the upper 50s f and we are using the small stove.

The trick is to keep all interior door open including any bathrooms with vents.

The natural convection will allow the cold air to flow along th floor and the warm air to flow along the ceiling.

Trying to blow heat (as was mentioned) is not as effective as pushing the cold air along the floor.

Warm air rises and cold air sinks. Just use the natural laws of physics to make it happen.

Our Ranch layout will circulate the heat very well.


Another trick if you want to speed the process up some is to turn on your air handler (Central HVAC system) and allow the fan to stir things up some. Just running the fan will move a lot of air quickly and circulate it to the farthest places from the heat source.



Back many years ago, we had a house with about 1400 Square feet in it, a long hall way and very cut up layout.

The Pellet stove was in the living room back in an alcove.
Starting the stove and heating that room would soon cause air to start flowing across the floor coming towards the stove.

As long as the bedroom and bathroom doors were left open the air circulation would get into full swing within about 20 minutes and the entire house would stay cozy, even in cold weather.

Now all this said, there can be certain circumstances that will prevent the air from flowing.

I have heard many folks say " You can't drive heat down a Hallway"
Well obviously they had not heard about convection.

Another trick is, if you have a CASSABLANCA fan, in the living room, is to run it on SUCK mode to pull the cooler air up from the floor.

This will enable the warmer air to circulate and to flow out away from the incoming cold air from the remainder of the house.

Our use of mulitple stoves was a great solution given the floor plan. The stoves basically aim at each other and keep the air well stired up.

Having stoves in bedrooms is normally not allowed so that is not an option.

Try a couple of those little "Booster fans" near the floor pushing the cold air back to the stove, betcha you will see a big difference.

Good luck

Snowy
 
Snowy:
You say you have a pellet stove in your family room - does the room get really warm to the point where you roast, or do the fans pushing the air around help that situation?
 
Yes, our largest stove is in the family room.
The family room however is very large at about 18 feet square and the bedrooms adjoin on one end and the kitchen is on the other side.

The house is a very open layout without any hallways to have to deal with.

The stove is in One corner and sits on a raised hearth. The stove blows out into th entire room and out towards tha kitchen and dining room and then on towards the living room.

If the outside temps are in the 50's the large stove is too much and we shut ot off and use the little one thats WAAAAAAAAAAAAY over in the corner of the living room. and it blows back towards the dining room and then into the family room.

We dont use any extra fans. On occasion I will turn on the HVAC air handler and let it circulate for a bit. especially if the stoves have been off and the house gets cold.
 
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