Heating house?

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jorswift

Member
Jan 25, 2016
116
Indiana
I have about 1800sqft house. Typical ranch and not very open. Newer home with 3 bedrooms, office, kitchen and living room. The 2 beds are on the opposite sides of the master bed. The POS insert I have now is in the living room, where I would be putting wood stove. Currently with the fireplace the living room gets hot, but the rooms are cold. How do you all get the heat to move around and into the back rooms? I know I will probably have to move my Tstat or replace it with a “smart” Tstat with room sensors, but would like to know how to minimize my auxiliary heat! Thanks.
 
Typical problem for a ranch. Try this simple test:
Put a 12" table or a box fan at the far end of the hallway, placed on the floor, pointing toward the woodstove room. Run the fan on low speed. It will blow the cooler air down low, toward the woodstove. The denser cool air will be replaced with lighter warm air from the stove room. Running this way you should notice at least a 5F increase in the hallway temp after about 30 minutes running.

Is there a basement in the house?
 
You need a boiler tied to your radiators or wood furnace tied to existing ductwork.
 
You need a boiler tied to your radiators or wood furnace tied to existing ductwork.
That's not going to work if the house is on a slab.

jorswift, what is the current insert that is installed and how many sq ft are you trying to heat?
 
Typical problem for a ranch. Try this simple test:
Put a 12" table or a box fan at the far end of the hallway, placed on the floor, pointing toward the woodstove room. Run the fan on low speed. It will blow the cooler air down low, toward the woodstove. The denser cool air will be replaced with lighter warm air from the stove room. Running this way you should notice at least a 5F increase in the hallway temp after about 30 minutes running.

Is there a basement in the house?

No basement just crawl space. I will have to try it. Thanks.
 
That's not going to work if the house is on a slab.

jorswift, what is the current insert that is installed and how many sq ft are you trying to heat?

No radiators. All electric heat pump with six heat in furnace. No room for wood furnace, unfortunately.
 
The house is about 2000 with a bonus room upstairs, but it’s a toy/game room. So down stairs is about 1700-1800. The insert is a pos majestic factory build fireplace. Going/wanting to rip it out and install wood stove.