Moving warm air

[Mrs. Krabappel]

My little stove is performing well. After my initial problems with not getting a good seal on the door I am no longer afraid to let her get hot. If fact I run her pretty hot before I shut down the air. She seems to like to cruise at 600-650 stovetop. The little engine that could. My current wood stash is great.

But, I'm not getting the hot air moved like I need to.

The house is drafty and under insulated, but that if that were the main problem I would expect the room that the stove is in get warmer than it does, but lose the heat quickly (which it does). Further insulation is not going to happen until later in the spring.

So the more immediate problem is moving the warm air from the stove area.

I do have a small fan pointed to the stove that helps quite a bit.

The stove sits almost flush in a brick lined masonry fireplace with a block off plate. Will investing in a blower solve this problem? Can I put something around the stove that will make a difference?


All things considered, we are still much warmer than when I the furnace was our sole source of heat.
The best Hearth.com advice I didn't take was spend your stove money to insulate

TIA!

 

[Stonefly]

A ceiling fan in our stove room made big difference in moving the heat around. We too are working on the insulation issue. Attic is the next targeted area.

 

[JustWood]

Great stuff and caulk may be your best and most inexpensive answer for a drafty house. It should be done prior to insulation anyway.

 

[cptoneleg]

Because of our drafty, old house the fan pointing at the stove, that is often the suggested methed on this site did not work. It pulled more cold air out of the allready drafty spots, so fan behind stove moving warm air towards bedrooms works best for this old house. When I finish the floors, trimming and sealing new windows, I plan on giving the old pull cold air to the stove trick.

Kathleen I like your new makeover.

LOL

 

[Boozie]

A ceiling fan in our stove room made big difference in moving the heat around. We too are working on the insulation issue. Attic is the next targeted area.

I have a ceiling fan in the room where my insert is, but the installers told me not to use it (I don't think the guys who installed my insert have same) What is best setting for the fan .... blowing toward the ceiling or the floor?

Also, when using a box fan blowing air towards the insert/heat .... how far away from the insert should it be?

 

[RNLA]

A blower will help a bunch. As ShamelessLEE said you have to go around and seal up the small cracks. This is not fun I am in the same spot right now. :grrr:

 

[Mrs. Krabappel]

Great stuff and caulk may be your best and most inexpensive answer for a drafty house. It should be done prior to insulation anyway.

Plus that stuff is pretty fun! Okay will get some more of that done.

One of my problems is that I'm not home all day so I have the furnace set as a back up. I have most of the furnace vents covered, but have to leave a couple uncovered. This, plus the return air vents let so much cold air up from the crawl space the rest of the time.

I don't have a ceiling fan in my living room. If I knew how to put one in I would also get rid of the stooopid recessed light. I might tackle that this summer when I have more time to play with electricity.

How could I possibly put a fan behind the stove? The cheap plastic jobbies I have would melt.

 

[rottiman]

Simple thing to keep in mind is that the faster and harder you try to push air around with ANY type of fan, the quicker it cools off. It takes very little push to move the warm air around. That is why those stove top eco fans work so well. I have one of my stoves recessed into a heatolator style fireplace. It has a blower on it which I have stopped using. Instead, I have placed a SMALL fan at the base on one side of the stove pushing heated air around the back of the stove out into the room. Hooked up a reostat to slow the little fan down ever more than the lowest setting. Amazing how much more warm air moves out as opposed to using the stove blower.

 

[Mrs. Krabappel]

Kathleen I like your new makeover.

Thanks. Dennis doesn't get the appeal of Krabappel

Kathleen, where on earth did you come up with such an awful avatar?

lmao

 

[RNLA]

No factory built blower??? For that stove...

 

[NH_Wood]

Kathleen I like your new makeover.

Thanks. Dennis doesn't get the appeal of Krabappel

Kathleen, where on earth did you come up with such an awful avatar?

lmao

Yes - I think we are all in favor of the snowbunny avatar...... :lol:

 

[Mrs. Krabappel]

No factory built blower??? For that stove...

Yes there is one.

 

[Boozie]

Kathleen I like your new makeover.

Thanks. Dennis doesn't get the appeal of Krabappel

Kathleen, where on earth did you come up with such an awful avatar?

lmao

Yes - I think we are all in favor of the snowbunny avatar...... :lol:

Where did you all find your avatars???

 

[Mrs. Krabappel]

Yes - I think we are all in favor of the snowbunny avatar...... :lol:

Quit yer bitchin' or you'll get this

http://tvmedia.ign.com/tv/image/article/772/772104/simpsons-Selma_1173714136.jpg

 

[EatenByLimestone]

Radio Shack sells small (3.5" square) cage fans to cool electronics that do not use much power, yet move a lot of air. I used one of them as a blower for the century.

Matt

 

[Dix]

K, I've found with the intermittent fan issues I'm having with the PE (waiting on warranty blower to arrive), that when the fan decides "not today", that I can take a small box fan and aim it to "blow by" the door glass, that I get more heat than with the fan just blowing aimlessly into the room.

Worth a try

PS - I like the bitchin' avatar ;-P

 

[nannyscriv]

I don't know if this will help but this is what we do for getting heat to move around our raised ranch...our stove is in the farthest part of the basement (our family room really) it is a closed room with a doorway into the rest of the basement where the stairs are to go into the rest of the house....we put a fan set on low about 4 feet from the doorway pointed towards our den (where the stove is) POINTED DOWN to the floor (its an osculating fan held in the straight position) ....its about 4 feet from the stairs to go up into the rest of the house...works like a charm...pulls the cold air from upstairs down into the basement and pushes the warm air from the den through the doorway up the stairs to the rest of the house...keeps our 2000 sq. ft house at about 68 ...all in all its about 12-15 feet from the stove....remember warm air is lighter than cold air...cold air sinks we keep our paddle fans (one in stairwell and one in kitchen)Set to run counterclockwise on low...works like a charm! good luck!

A ceiling fan in our stove room made big difference in moving the heat around. We too are working on the insulation issue. Attic is the next targeted area.

I have a ceiling fan in the room where my insert is, but the installers told me not to use it (I don't think the guys who installed my insert have same) What is best setting for the fan .... blowing toward the ceiling or the floor?

Also, when using a box fan blowing air towards the insert/heat .... how far away from the insert should it be?

 

[Heem]

I've got the same stove. This house is 200 years old so drafty is an UNDERSTATEMENT. I still manage to see 83 degrees in this room, 70's upstairs, and.. well the pipes don't freeze in the kitchen. Mine is at the bottom of the stairs so the air can go up very easily. To keep this room (25x13) warm I point a fan not at the stove but directly above it, that seems to work best.

I'd like to get the blower too, if you get it, do let me know how it works out for you.

 

[art 65]

Hi Kathleen,
I have an old drafty home too, mine has ten foot ceilings. What I have been finding is you can take a box fan and sit it on low blowing out of the cold room and it will pull the heat in at the top of the doorway and help equalize the difference in temperature.
I also have the old transom windows above my doors. After finding out about the box fan blowing out I thougth I would try opening them up. Wow what a difference with them open you don't really need the box fan for very long. I then tried it with ceiling fan on in the cold room, on low in reverse, and my cold room (master bedroom) was very comfortable very quickly. It pushed the warm air in the ceiling down along the walls. My windows in there are single pane antique glass drafty giants (86"'s tall). With the warms air traveling down the walls I couldn't feel the cold from them at all.

 

[NH_Wood]

Yes - I think we are all in favor of the snowbunny avatar...... :lol:

Quit yer bitchin' or you'll get this

http://tvmedia.ign.com/tv/image/article/772/772104/simpsons-Selma_1173714136.jpg

Okay, I take it back! Cheers!

 

[Mrs. Krabappel]

To keep this room (25x13) warm I point a fan not at the stove but directly above it

There is a lot of warm air that stagnates above the stove.

Matt I like that little electronics fan idea.

Great suggestions! Thanks

 

[NH_Wood]

To keep this room (25x13) warm I point a fan not at the stove but directly above it

There is a lot of warm air that stagnates above the stove.

Matt I like that little electronics fan idea.

Great suggestions! Thanks

K - just read your sig - Huxley quote - you have been reading evolutionary bio indeed - bringing out the bulldog! Cheers!

 

[Lumber-Jack]

I don't have the exact same problem as you because our stove room can get pretty hot if we just left air circulation to natural convection. The room the stove is in is an addition which was insulated from the rest of the house and separated by two passageways , it has a 10 ft ceiling while the rest of the house has only 8 ceilings. That extra 2 ft can trap a lot of heat, so I hooked up a ducted circulation fan and a couple elbows of ducting above the first passage way. It works great!
I also run my HVAC fan on low to help keep things moving, but the ducted fan really gets that trapped air out of the stove room and moves it upstairs and to the rest of the house.

Here's a basic diagram of the house showing the flow.

 

[Mrs. Krabappel]

K - just read your sig - Huxley quote - you have been reading evolutionary bio indeed - bringing out the bulldog! Cheers!

Only you Jacques, would recognize that.

Are you in the field this summer? Would love to bring the boy on a tag along to a real bat cave when we are in New England if that's possible.

Here's a basic diagram of the house showing the flow.

Oh, most excellent!

I've got the same stove. This house is 200 years old so drafty is an UNDERSTATEMENT. I still manage to see 83 degrees in this room,

I am not getting those temps. Not even close.

 

[JustWood]

Yes - I think we are all in favor of the snowbunny avatar...... :lol:

Quit yer bitchin' or you'll get this

http://tvmedia.ign.com/tv/image/article/772/772104/simpsons-Selma_1173714136.jpg

Dohhhhhht!