Heat Distribution Kit - FP25

[venator260]

I built a new addition onto my house, and, as I expected, heat does not flow into the new part from my existing PE FP25. The fireplace heated the old part of the house just fine, even on the coldest of days. Most of the time, my issue was getting the house too warm. I can still get the old part into the high 70s and 80s if I'm not careful, but that does not migrate into my new addition.

My question here is, would a heat distribution kit push a decent amount of heat to my new part, or should I be looking at wood furnaces for the basement for better heat distribution? I included a floor plan of the first floor of my house as it is that I drew with the website Floorplanner and while walking around my house with a tape measure. The new part is the living and dining rooms on the left hand side of the picture. The existing fireplace is in the top right corner. Under the entire structure is a full basement.

I'd like to use both ports out of the FP25 if I could, and have two runs to the new part, one to each room. Alternatively, I could dump all of the heat into the new dining room, and some would no doubt migrate into the new living room.

 

[begreen]

That will be a bit of a challenge, particularly the dining room. What is the ceiling height in the new area? Can you access the fireplace outlet port easily and is there room for the duct in the fireplace enclosure?
Here is what I would try first. On the next cold day when the fireplace is burning a full load, take a 12" table or box fan and put it on the floor in the living room, pointed toward the fireplace room. Run it on medium or low speed. Take the LR temp beforehand and then about 60 minutes after turning the fan on. See if that makes a notable rise in the LR temp (+ 5º).

 

[venator260]

That will be a bit of a challenge, particularly the dining room. What is the ceiling height in the new area? Can you access the fireplace outlet port easily and is there room for the duct in the fireplace enclosure?
Here is what I would try first. On the next cold day when the fireplace is burning a full load, take a 12" table or box fan and put it on the floor in the living room, pointed toward the fireplace room. Run it on medium or low speed. Take the LR temp beforehand and then about 60 minutes after turning the fan on. See if that makes a notable rise in the LR temp (+ 5º).

So in the enclosure, there is room to run the duct work. I'd be getting into a bit of tile repair, but I put it in the first time, and I have enough extra to fix it back up.

The ceilings in the new part are standard 8 foot ceilings. In the old part there a bit lower... 7.5 maybe? Rooms that I've redone needed about 6 inches cut from every drywall sheet.

I've tried the box fan on the floor blowing cold air into the stove room. Works good to get heat back to the gym, office, and bathroom. And warms the kitchen up well enough. But I've experimented with placement of the fan, and (according to the temperatures on the digital thermostats hooked to the baseboards), I can get about 6 degrees over an evening of heating. Overnight, and then through the day when I'm at work, the temperatures fall back down. Much of this, I'm sure, is driven by heat loss from the old, less insulated parts of my house over the 18 hours or so that the fire doesn't get fed as much as it could.

And, I've got a fan in the middle of the floor, which isn't wife approved.

So I suppose that I am curious about if I were to make the run from the fireplace, out the top, down through the floor, across 20 feet or so of basement (through insulated duct), and back up through the floor, will I still have hot air to make this worth it?

 

[begreen]

Yes, it should deliver decent heat to the LR. How much will depend on the heat loss of the duct to the basement and velocity, but it should help. Keep the run straight with a minimum of elbows.

 

[KC2004]

You might check out an inline duct fan like this if you want to move more air than the typical duct kit fan. We use this in our ducting system on our Kozy Z42. 8 speeds and they make a silencer to reduce noise if needed. If you don’t need as much airflow they also make register booster fans which could work. I think they move 120cfm compared to 400 for the duct fan.

Duct Fan