Through the Wall Fans

[Jaugust124]

Has anyone installed one those Suncourt through the wall fans, and if so, how do you like it? I have a corner doorway fan mounted and it moves some heat, but I was wondering if the through the wall fans would move more of the heat where I need it.

Thanks.

 

[Stephen in SoKY]

I put one high in a stove alcove to move hot air:

It blows into the dining room and the rest of the house:

I'm satisfied with the fan. In combination with a small fan on the floor returning cold air to the stove room it works very well, without the return fan, not so much. However, on low the noise is very noticable in the den where the stove is.

 

[Jaugust124]

Thanks for the lone reply. I guess nobody else out there is using them. I see they are about $60 at HD and I was thinking of maybe installing one next season. Your response very very helpful.
Thank you!

 

[pring7]

I’ve been looking into similar through-the-wall fans. Woodstock and Condar sell models too. I would like to find one that moves air well, but is pretty quiet. Maybe this is a tall order. I have also figured that having one for a cold air return would maximize the air circulating efficiency.

The room where my wood stove will be is a sunroom with cathedral ceilings and I want to seal off the room when I don’t have time to build a fire. I’m worried that if I install one or two of these fans that it (they) will draft out heat to that sunroom from the main part of the house. If the fans don’t have a damper option, I would probably try to rig something up with a sheet of plastic or something.

It seems like there would be a higher end model of these that could close and maybe have a thermostat feature. I doubt the market would be big enough to try to get a patent for this if it hasn’t been already done.

Well, once the room is built and the new (reconditioned) Woodstock Paladian is installed I will post some pics of the setup and vents I settle on.

 

[budman]

Try Mcmaster-carr.com i bought a tru the wall fan that is hard wired with variable speed switch
the name of fan is penn.

 

[pring7]

Will do, thanks!

 

[John_M]

panasonic wall fans have an excellent reputation with many builders. Try this link: http://www2.panasonic.com/consumer-...Fans/model.FV-08WQ1_11002_7000000000000005702

 

[woodgeek]

In round figures, the heat moved by hot air is (in BTU/h) something like the CFM times the temp difference (in °F). If the fan is 60 CFM, and the air near the ceiling of your stove room is 20°F warmer than the next room over, then you are moving a whopping 1200 BTU/h, or about 350W.

Bottom line, the reason folks here like big fans moving air through the living space is that they move a LOT more cfm than these little inline guys, using less elec and producing less noise in the process. Those duct fans are either intended for ventilation (low cfm ok) or moving rather hot air (low cfm still ok).

 

[double-d]

My neighbor has one, between his house and shop, says it works great, but at higher speeds it's a little noisy. He really doesn't mind thought, he uses that as an excuse when his wife tries to talks to him! I'd say that's a plus for buying one.

 

[SteveKG]

I put an 8-inch fan near the top of the wall, then later on I put another one just above the floor. The upper one blows hot air out of the room into another room, the bottom fan blows the opposite direction, from the cold room back into the warm room. The single, upper fan worked ok, with a door between the rooms open, but the dual set-up works much better. I have them both wired into a single, inexpensive [$15] thermostat.

 

[budman]

In round figures, the heat moved by hot air is (in BTU/h) something like the CFM times the temp difference (in °F). If the fan is 60 CFM, and the air near the ceiling of your stove room is 20°F warmer than the next room over, then you are moving a whopping 1200 BTU/h, or about 350W.

Bottom line, the reason folks here like big fans moving air through the living space is that they move a LOT more cfm than these little inline guys, using less elec and producing less noise in the process. Those duct fans are either intended for ventilation (low cfm ok) or moving rather hot air (low cfm still ok).

Well it heats 3 bedrooms and master bath for me so i'm happy with it.

 

[Slow1]

I wonder if you were doing a single fan setup if it would be best to put it low and use it to move the cold air into the stove room rather than high to move warm air out. I'm sure it would all depend on the path the air would then have to travel out of the stove room, but... In any case the dual-fan is almost certainly the best of the forced air exchange options.

Each time I read these threads I'm thankful that I lucked out in having a home with an open enough floor plan that natural convection takes care of 90+% of our needs. The last bit are two rooms we don't use much (hmm is that because they are colder? ha ha). Anyway, I suppose moving heat around is why those victorian homes with 100's of rooms had an almost equal number of fireplaces eh?

 

[Jaugust124]

In my case, I have only one door going out of the stove room and its a standard 32" (roughly) interior door. I thought that if I put a through-the-wall fan into my dining area which is only accessible from the foyer, than it would keep that area warmer. There is really no way to blow the cold air from the dining room into the stove room without cutting a hole in the wall to install a fan. I wonder if installing a fan blowing warm air from the stove room to the dining room and just putting in vents to allow cold air to travel from the dr to the stove room would work?

I remember reading somewhere online that the Suncourt moves about 200cfm.

I would like to post a floor plan of my house, but I haven't figured out how to do that yet. If anyone knows, I would appreciate the help. I made a floor plan using Microsoft Word, but I can't copy and paste it.

My only other option is to get out the old sledge hammer and start knocking down walls.

 

[Slow1]

[quote author="Jaugust124" date="1299649398"There is really no way to blow the cold air from the dining room into the stove room without cutting a hole in the wall to install a fan. I wonder if installing a fan blowing warm air from the stove room to the dining room and just putting in vents to allow cold air to travel from the dr to the stove room would work?
[/quote]

My suggestion is to put the fan in the wall low and blow it into the stove room from your dining room (I presume from your description above that they share a wall). Then you can put your vents in high if you like to allow the warm air to vent back in if you like.

Cold air is more dense than warm - that same 200cf of air will expand when warmed - thus you can effectively move more air. I don't know how material the density difference is for the temperature deltas you are dealing with, but... Now another potential benefit is that you are likely to want to run the fan in the dining room when you are in there - the noise is likely to be greatest in the room where the fan is blowing into. With my design the stove room gets more noise when the fan is running and the dining room less - when you are enjoying the stove room perhaps you will not run the fan (or run it at a lower speed).

Again - all this is my own conjecture, no actual experience to base this on.

 

[Jaugust124]

Yes, the stove room and dining room do share a wall. As far as noise goes, we are in the family room 85% of the time that we are home. Right now we have the blower going o the stove and the door fan going and its fine. If air blowing into the room will create much more noise, that may not be an option. My thought was to put two fans in the stove room, both up high blowing warm air out. One into the kitchen and the other to the dining room. Checking temps in the stove room toward the ceiling I find them to be 8-10 degrees higher. I could be wrong, but I don't think that just putting in vents up high with no air being mechanically forced through them will do much. I have two vents (for air conditioning) that I purposely left open from the stove room to the kitchen and I don't think a whole lot of air is passing through them.

The dining room and formal living room really don't get used much at all. In fact, we refer to them as "the museum" since they are used so little. Other than just closing them off completely for the winter and lowering the thermostat to 55, I would rather run some warm air in there to keep the furnace from kicking on.