Moving Woodstove Heat around the house

[VCBurner]

Hello Jutt77,
I agree with the things you said about moving hot air around the house! But there is only one problem with your theory:
There are two parts to achieving a good HVAC system. Supply and return. Without return air, supply air will not be as effective. The best solution is to combine both and get the ideal air movement. The level of success achieved with only one of these theories depends on too many variables. So, the end result can't be measured on this thread. The proof is in the pudding. If one more works better than the other in a particular home then that's what should be used. I don't it's a matter of right or wrong here!

Thats a good point, my solution works well in my particular home, floorplan, amount of insulation (or lack of), etc. Adding another fan blowing cold air towards the stove would probably add good results as well but I've found that I dont need it at this point. I might try it though on a really cold night and compare the differences.

I have thought about putting a corner door fan on my door header. The livingroom is quite a bit hotter than the rooms furthest from it, just like yours. I could see a corner header fan doing wonders at pushing all that heat that gets trapped above the cased opening. Maybe you can put the fan on the bedroom doorway on the floor pointing out and we can compare results!
Thanks for the pics and blue print.

Chris

I think I'll try placing the fans at floor level blowing the opposite direction (towards the stove) then I'll record the temp results from various parts of the house every hour or so and get an average. Then I'll put the fans back up in the original location and record using the same method. I'll wait for back to back days of similar weather to help eliminate that variable and go from there and compare results.

My initial guess is that blowing towards the stove will indeed facilitate convection but those *&%^ transoms will probably be a problem.

Sounds great,
I tried putting one fan from the stove room up high touching the door header...and man...the heat that was blowing out of the room was amazing! I'm curious to see what a combination of these techniques will do!!

 

[VCBurner]

My stove is under a 2 part AC unit mounted just below the ceiling... i put that on FAN ONLY so it sucks air from about 3 inches from the ceiling and blows it at 45 degrees toward the hallway .. at the hall i have a fan on the floor blowing air back into the room... now i was wondering if a bathroom vent above the stove with a pipe leading up stairs throu the wall to about midway up the bedroom wall ( i dont want to cut a hole in the floor) would add heat to the bedroom any thoughts ?

I'm sure it would help. Hopefully this wouldn't be an exterior wall so you don't have to worry about heat loss.

 

[Todd]

My basement stove does most of the load and I have found my new Ceiling fan running in reverse draws a good amount of heat up from the basement and evens out the heat somewhat throughout. I also have a floor vent over the stove which the heat naturally rises up. When I installed the vent I was thinking the cooler air would fall through and push the warm air up the stairwell but it didn't work out that way like it did in a previuos house. I also installed a small fan inside the vent and tried blowing both directions and it seemed to work better blowing the warm air up. You just never know which way will work, you have to try them all.

The best solution I found was another stove. One on each level along with the ceiling fan evened out the heat nicely. No more cold spots in this house even in the coldest weather. It may be a little more work with 2 stoves but I don't need to run both 24/7 all the time and I can also switch back and forth and let one take a break or do maintenance.

 

[VCBurner]

There are some hot air transfer kits on the market. I've often thought about trying one of these.
(broken link removed to http://www.dualheating.com.au/air-transfer-kits.htm)

 

[loon]

this is heading towards the bedrooms.

the bottom of it is 7'2" so still lots of room..

loon

Where did you get this fan?

It appears to be a window fan. I have two. They can either blow air in or out. Some allow one fan to blow in while the other fan blows out. During the spring/summer they work great as long as the temps aren't too hot and the humidity isn't too high.

thats all it is and its wired down to a switch on the wall...

loon

 

[VCBurner]

There's another company that sells throught he wall type vents. One unit uses the wall cavity in between studs and the other is an inline round fan. They also have level to level air transfer systems!
Pretty interesting and easy to install.
http://www.rewci.com/aireshare-hard-wired-room-ventilator.html#

 

[MarshVegasMA]

Greetings, South Shore, MA here. Just put a Harman P43 free standing pellet stove in finished basesment (somewhat insulated, former garage space) and a Lennox wood insert on the other finished side of the basement (insulated). I also put a Harman Accentra Pellet insert in the upstairs living space. Needless to say it is toasty all around except for down the hallway to the bedrooms and bathrooms. We have infants and need the house to be warm in the bedrooms. I know we did overkill with stoves for the size of the house (1800 sq ft), but all this time I have been trying to draw the warm air down the hallway, when I am hearing now that I should pull the cold air towards the heat source. I am using the ceiling fan on reverse and drawing the warm air up into the Cathedral style ceilings so it can cascade back down the walls. Will try and continue using some Physics and Engineering principles to get the air flow adequate. Thanks for all the advice as I am brand new to the pellet, wood stove world and new to this site. Cheers.

 

[GunSeth]

We have a stove in a finished basement. We were using two Vornado fans - one pointing at the stove and one at the top of the stairs pointing down. The last week we haven't been using them and it seems that we get about the heat movement. So I dunno.

 

[VCBurner]

Greetings, South Shore, MA here. Just put a Harman P43 free standing pellet stove in finished basesment (somewhat insulated, former garage space) and a Lennox wood insert on the other finished side of the basement (insulated). I also put a Harman Accentra Pellet insert in the upstairs living space. Needless to say it is toasty all around except for down the hallway to the bedrooms and bathrooms. We have infants and need the house to be warm in the bedrooms. I know we did overkill with stoves for the size of the house (1800 sq ft), but all this time I have been trying to draw the warm air down the hallway, when I am hearing now that I should pull the cold air towards the heat source. I am using the ceiling fan on reverse and drawing the warm air up into the Cathedral style ceilings so it can cascade back down the walls. Will try and continue using some Physics and Engineering principles to get the air flow adequate. Thanks for all the advice as I am brand new to the pellet, wood stove world and new to this site. Cheers.

Welcome aboard and good luck. Let us know what you find!

 

[hotprinter]

Installing the blaze king today, but had a snag. The hearth is too small so they would not hook it up. Anyway, we had some vents installed above the stove which sits in the middle of the basement, and 2 at opposite ends of the room hoping the hot air will come up the vents by the stove and cold air will go down the other vents. We also have a ceiling fan in the upstairs room above the vents by the stove. I am so excited to try this as it seems to make sense to me. I will keep you posted as soon as we get it hooked up.

 

[fran35]

I am in the middle of an install in my insulated, finished basement that was a former garage. Above this hearth room(which also doubles as a TV room) are two bedrooms. I have considered installing vents/small duct fan through to the bedrooms. However, these two bedrooms will have my children in them and I wonder if the sound from the TV will travel through the vents and if there is any way to combat that. Also, should I have these duct fans point down into the hearth room returning cold air or up into the bedrooms bringing heat?

 

[VCBurner]

I am in the middle of an install in my insulated, finished basement that was a former garage. Above this hearth room(which also doubles as a TV room) are two bedrooms. I have considered installing vents/small duct fan through to the bedrooms. However, these two bedrooms will have my children in them and I wonder if the sound from the TV will travel through the vents and if there is any way to combat that. Also, should I have these duct fans point down into the hearth room returning cold air or up into the bedrooms bringing heat?

One way to combat the noise is to put in ducts with an inline fan. But this would require some work since your ceiling is already finished. I would just cut the registers first and see how the affect the temperature in the rooms without the fans. I had a stove in the basement and the room up above was my bedroom, the register which was located across the way from the bedroom door, acted as an air supply for the stove. There was no air coming up from the basement throught the register. This occured naturaly without the help of any fans. This created negative pressure in the bedroom, sucking in hot air from the hallway. The warmth also radiated up through the floor. You could walk barefoot in my bedroom because the floors were warm. Of course the ceiling bellow was not finished.

 

[fran35]

I am in the middle of an install in my insulated, finished basement that was a former garage. Above this hearth room(which also doubles as a TV room) are two bedrooms. I have considered installing vents/small duct fan through to the bedrooms. However, these two bedrooms will have my children in them and I wonder if the sound from the TV will travel through the vents and if there is any way to combat that. Also, should I have these duct fans point down into the hearth room returning cold air or up into the bedrooms bringing heat?

One way to combat the noise is to put in ducts with an inline fan. But this would require some work since your ceiling is already finished. I would just cut the registers first and see how the affect the temperature in the rooms without the fans. I had a stove in the basement and the room up above was my bedroom, the register which was located across the way from the bedroom door, acted as an air supply for the stove. There was no air coming up from the basement throught the register. This occured naturaly without the help of any fans. This created negative pressure in the bedroom, sucking in hot air from the hallway. The warmth also radiated up through the floor. You could walk barefoot in my bedroom because the floors were warm. Of course the ceiling bellow was not finished.

Actually, the basement and the stove are both in the process of being installed/finished. The drywall and insulation has not gone up in the basement ceiling and I am hoping to make the coorect decision before the room is finished. So, to clarify, you have the fans pumping the bedroom air into the basement? and the duct fan cuts down on the noise? This is actually perfect timing for me, as the basement will be finished in another few weeks and installing duct fans now will save a headache once it is all done. What size ductwork/fan/register do you recommend?

 

[VCBurner]

I am in the middle of an install in my insulated, finished basement that was a former garage. Above this hearth room(which also doubles as a TV room) are two bedrooms. I have considered installing vents/small duct fan through to the bedrooms. However, these two bedrooms will have my children in them and I wonder if the sound from the TV will travel through the vents and if there is any way to combat that. Also, should I have these duct fans point down into the hearth room returning cold air or up into the bedrooms bringing heat?

One way to combat the noise is to put in ducts with an inline fan. But this would require some work since your ceiling is already finished. I would just cut the registers first and see how the affect the temperature in the rooms without the fans. I had a stove in the basement and the room up above was my bedroom, the register which was located across the way from the bedroom door, acted as an air supply for the stove. There was no air coming up from the basement throught the register. This occured naturaly without the help of any fans. This created negative pressure in the bedroom, sucking in hot air from the hallway. The warmth also radiated up through the floor. You could walk barefoot in my bedroom because the floors were warm. Of course the ceiling bellow was not finished.

Actually, the basement and the stove are both in the process of being installed/finished. The drywall and insulation has not gone up in the basement ceiling and I am hoping to make the coorect decision before the room is finished. So, to clarify, you have the fans pumping the bedroom air into the basement? and the duct fan cuts down on the noise? This is actually perfect timing for me, as the basement will be finished in another few weeks and installing duct fans now will save a headache once it is all done. What size ductwork/fan/register do you recommend?

I was referring to the fans sucking the warm air out of the stove room and up to the bedrooms above. I think this would work the best without having to have a bunch of fans on the floor or up in your doorway. Kind of like this picture, but the registers would be on the floor and warm air would be blowing up instead of down from the ceiling. There's a link above to the kit in the picture, but the same could be done with a simple insulated duct and inline fan for much less money than the kit. Just see your local HVAC supplier, not the big box stores, the local guy will usually help you more and have some real experience.

The wholes on the floor and ceiling would not be inline with each other and the ducts insulated. This would help decrease the noise transferred from floor to floor. The ducts can be 10" off the stove room into 6" into the bedrooms. This is just a recommendation, I'm a carpenter not an HVAC guy, but it's typical of what you would see in the field. Not engineered by a professional, but I think it would work well.

 

[hotprinter]

I am in the middle of an install in my insulated, finished basement that was a former garage. Above this hearth room(which also doubles as a TV room) are two bedrooms. I have considered installing vents/small duct fan through to the bedrooms. However, these two bedrooms will have my children in them and I wonder if the sound from the TV will travel through the vents and if there is any way to combat that. Also, should I have these duct fans point down into the hearth room returning cold air or up into the bedrooms bringing heat?

REPLY:
Be careful cutting holes in the kids bedroom floor. I would rather not have that in the kids room as the sheetrock on the basement ceiling is a fire block.