Fireplace placement for new construction

[searle7]

Hi everyone!

I'm building a new home with a 1,800 insulated heated basement and 1,800 main floor for a total living area of 3,600 sq feet. The house is pretty open floor plan with flat 9' ceilings. I will be installing propane forced air furnace in the house but would like to supplement as much as I can with wood heat as propane can be expensive. I live in southeast Idaho where temperatures remain below freezing most of the winter.

My question is where/what do I place my fireplaces. Currently no one will live in the basement but my kids will in a few years. My thought is place a epa ZC fireplace upstairs and maybe a pellet stove downstairs. This way I can just run the fireplace upstairs and when I need the heat downstairs, I can just run the pellet stove. However, I've spoken to family and they said to put the fireplace in the basement as heat rises but it seems a pain as we spend most the time on the main floor. Is it possible to have a fireplace in the basement and heat both floor effectively?

My other question is if I decide with the fireplace on the main floor should I need a duct kit like on kozy heats z42 to distribute the heat better around on the main floor?

Any advice for me?

Thanks

 

[begreen]

Don't make the mistake of so many modern homes by tacking them onto the end of the house in a great room. Make the fireplace central to the floorplan and keep the chimney inside the house envelope. If you are considering full time wood heat you might want to look at masonry or a Russian fireplaces for 24/7 heating. It can be used as a room divider and focal point. Run an extra flue in the masonry if you think you will want a wood stove in the basement.

http://woodheat.org/locating-chimney.html
http://www.tulikivi.com/usa-can
http://www.timwmasonry.com/Service/russian-fireplace-seattle.htm
http://homeenergypros.lbl.gov/forum/topics/russian-wood-stoves-masonry-stoves

 

[Pug]

Searle;
I have a couple of thoughts for you to consider. I have a 3100 sq ft house, half up half down in a daylight basement. I just installed a wood stove in the basement. Firstly if you are talking a regular fireplace understand they are not very efficient and burn a lot of wood. I also have had fireplaces and although pretty they aren't very functional even with heatalators in them. I have also have had a pellet stove. They are wood fired furnaces basically but handy and cleaner where you can just load them out of a bag of pellets but pellets are not to cheap either. When your power goes out, as ours did in Hagerman, Id, you are up the creek. They do make a little noise when feeding pellets into the stove and the fire isn't viewably as nice as seeing the fire in a wood stove with a nice glass door.
The least expensive wood source is wood you cut yourself of course. In our house upstairs where we spend most of our time we have a gas fired fireplace. No fuss no mess. We use it for the fire view and a quick warm up on cold winter mornings. I love it. We decided on putting a viewable woodstove downstairs to have a completely electricity free heat source downstairs that we could also cook on. It is located in a far corner of the basement away from the stairs which isn't the best but I am going to put a large vent grate directly above it to make it easy for the heat to go upstairs and circulate better.
Hope this gives you some ideas.

 

[searle7]

Thanks for the input. Yes I plan on putting an epa certified fireplace for the upstairs. It is pretty central in the layout and doesn't border an outside wall. I figures pellet downstairs cause I won't be down there as much and down want to be hauling logs down the stairs. Pellets seem easier, though I could be wrong. I also thought about putting a propane fireplace downstairs, though I don't know what I would be gaining as my furnace is propane and would be the same cost to run.

 

[begreen]

There are several good EPA fireplaces on the market. The central location will help even out the heat. How tall are the ceilings in great room?
There is not much difference between carrying a 40 lb. bag of pellets and an armload of firewood. Burning however is much different. But it is much easier to store a ton of pellets in the basement without much mess. Would it be possible to install a dumbwaiter system from the garage to load the basement?