Part 3 of My Mega-Query: The House Details

[TruePatriot]

Part 3 of My Mega-Query: The House Details

Welcome to Part 3 of My Mega-Query: Which Woodstove to Get?

The house the stove is going into is in southern NYS, and is a remodeled, 1890’s farmhouse. Though only 2,000 sq. ft. (not counting its very small, unfinished, boulder-walled basement) there are MANY factors which convince me I should treat the house as more like 3,500 sq. ft.—in other words, that I need a large wood stove.

These “big stove” factors are:

a) The house is almost completely an open plan, downstairs. Of the five “rooms” only one has a door or inner walls on it, (other than the half bath).

b) 80% of the downstairs has oddly-shaped cathedral ceilings, ranging between 9 – 10’ high.

c) Two of the downstairs "rooms," and a good portion of a third, are sitting on concrete slabs. I should explain: the house was almost doubled in size with the addition of “bump out” additions on slabs. (Yes, the floors are very cold in places!) The upstairs is ½ the size of the downstairs—roughly 800 sq. ft. vs. 1,200 sq. ft.

d) The previous owner’s gutting and “bumping out” for the open plan left too little baseboard hot water coverage downstairs, such that the 140,000 btu gas boiler can’t keep the downstairs heated adequately, once the temps get down into the 20’s. The upstairs is warm as toast (2 zones).

e) The insertion of an I-beam, to allow the open plan, created upside down “air dams” on the ceilings, a design which the remodelers carried throughout the downstairs, such that there are multiple “air dams” which will hamper (or stop dead?) heat flow throughout the downstairs.

Despite the low success rate of schemes to move air away from wood stoves, which I’ve read about here, I have a plan to move it, near the ceiling, to the ice cold, concrete-slabbed “bump out” we call a dining room—with its 10’ cathedral ceiling. Basically, I want to suspend a 12” pipe up near the ceiling by the woodstove, and run it down the hall and around one corner, for a total run of 18’. I plan to use a thermostatically-controlled squirrel cage fan. The pipe will be level, and in the warm air near the ceiling, so I figure it has a chance of working. I plan on having it exhaust at floor level, into the cold, slab-foundation, cathedral-ceilinged, three-outside-walled “dining room”—the one with the HUGE glass doors. “Meat locker” would be a better description of this room.

(But my “forced air scheme” is not my question for now—I’ll pester you about that in “Phase II, next winter.)

f) We will be using the existing external, masonry chimney, which currently has a fireplace in it, which I blocked off. I’ve read enough on this site to know this is NOT ideal, and that a chimney inside the “house’s envelope” would be best. However, if you picture in your mind a house whose downstairs is twice as big as it’s upstairs, you’ll understand that there is no good place to run a flue upstairs, without being in the middle of a bedroom, etc…. And while I wouldn’t mind that if the rooms were big enough, they are tiny (upstairs), and would preclude having a bed in them, if we did that. So the flue will go into the existing, masonry, fireplace chimney, which I’m guessing was added in the 1960’s or 1970’s. It is lined with tile, and we plan on an inspection, and a to-code thimble installed by a professional, along with a stainless liner, insulated with Vermiculite.

The chimney is a two-flue design, of brick construction and the fireplace flue is tile-lined. The chimney is two stories tall and also houses a separate flue for the gas boiler. There are two, small, cast iron “clean outs” in the basement, under the chimney.


So…I’m confident we need a large wood stove, i.e., 3 cu. ft. or better.

In successive postings, I will go into some general questions I have about the features I feel are important to me, in a wood stove. In later posts, I will ask some questions about the five stoves I am particularly interested in. Again, succeeding posts will have a link back to this post (#3), should you want to refresh yourself about the details of the proposed installation.

I really, really appreciate any time and energy you choose to put into my queries, and I hope that there is enough general interest in my queries, by new and potential wood burners, that no one feels I’m “abusing the privilege” of posting here, just because I can’t say in 20 pages what some writers could manage in two…my Dad always refers to it as “verbal diarrhea” …. I’m hoping not all of you agree with him. ;-)

With much appreciation,

Peter

 

[G-rott]

Insulate - Insulate - INSULATE.... did I mention insulation?

You should look into insulating the slabs from the outside, either a shallow wall or an umbrella style would help.

Other than that insulate and air seal everthing, then buy the big stove. I looked at the Morso 3610, but it was too large for my very well insulated very airtight 1600 sqft house. We bought the 2110 and it's great.

If you need any insulation help feel free to ask here or by a private message.

Garett

 

[restorer]

Peter, do you plan to run your boiler along with the stove? The reason I ask is two thought came to mind in your description, why not supplement the slab rooms with radiant floor heating? You could frame insulate and install hotwater heat and still have plenty of head room. This would certainly improve the chill factor. The second thought was, do you need to use only one stove? Have you considered installing a freestanding direct vent pellet stove in the freezer and do away with the extra ducting. A small unit like an Avalon Newport would provide great heating on a demand basis when you use the room.

Any way you go, try to add some insulation to those slab floors. This Summer I'm adding a rigid foam and plywood floor to my shop. Right now it's a slab and I get used to wearing insulated boots in the winter, it never gets warm. I use rubber mats in areas I stand for long periods. It helps, but I'd rather do at least 480 sf and close the envelope.

Are your ceilings coffered? Give us a better description, I can't get a handle on the "odd cathedral" concept. My thought was with high ceilings, lots of multi-speed reversible ceiling fans. Moving the warm air away from the ceiling will allow better movement. Have you thought of using vents through the walls or transoms above the doors that will allow air to move? They'd be cool in a home of that age. Or even turning doorways into arches extending higher than normal doorways. Victorian homes with 10-12 ft ceiling had very tall doors exactly to do this, move the warm air from room to room, or keep it in one area.

 

[colsmith]

If you have a good chimney already, I suppose you will want to use it. We thought about it, as our already existing chimney, used by the previous oil furnace, is not used by our newer gas furnace. However, it was not conveniently or centrally located, so eventually we ruled out putting the wood stove near it. We picked a very central position in our living room for our stove. It is beneath a medium sized bedroom. We have two 45 degree elbows in our stovepipe to make a small change in position so that the stainless steel chimney in the room above it is just inches from one wall and about 15 inches from the other. In other words, the chimney is practically in the corner of the bedroom, so it isn't precluding having a bed in there. We have lots of bookshelves and a table, desk, and sewing machine and craft junk in that room, no actual bed, but there is room if someone wants to put one in the future.

Having that setup puts a certain amount of heat into that bedroom from the chimney. Our bedroom is just on the other side of a wall from that. We didn't put it through our room as the door opens right into where the chimney would have gone if we ran it another 2 feet south. Anyway, we are quite pleased with our stove placement, although of course we did have to pay a lot for having the stainless chimney installed through the tallest part of our house. (And our draft seems TOO strong.) We weren't too sure how good the other chimney was anyway, having been unused for a few years. I am by no means an expert, this is our first stove, but we spent a lot of time thinking about chimneys and stove placement, and got estimates for placement in different parts of the house. Where we put our stove allows the heat to flow naturally all over the place (and up the stairs) so that has worked out well.

 

[babalu87]

Morso, Jotul and VC (all cast iron stoves) are all assembled with gasket material and bolts.

 

[elkimmeg]

Basically, I want to suspend a 12” pipe up near the ceiling by the woodstove, and run it down the hall and around one corner, for a total run of 18’. I plan to use a thermostatically-controlled squirrel cage fan. The pipe will be level, and in the warm air near the ceiling, so I figure it has a chance of working. I plan on having it exhaust at floor level, into the cold

No air duct return can be within 10' of the stove. supply without an engineered returns is useless many have tried few have suceeded. What safety features have you factored in?

 

[TruePatriot]

All:

(Yes, I'm finally getting back to the last of my original queries. After I respond to these, I'll start back through the more recent responses to my other queries.)

The attached pic is horrible, but is was the only one I could fit in. It was 62Kb, and the good version was 1.5 Mb, and since I've never posted a pic before, I have no clue....

The pic, bad as it is, may help make sense out of the following posts. If anyone is frustrated by long posts, please stop reading now. I am only trying to answer those who responded with questions and comments. The pic is so bad it requires even more words so, again, if you find yourself becoming frustrated, please move on--it's already been impressed upon me that my wordiness is tiresome to some.

Phew...so, about this pic. It was taken from below grade, from the house's right side, (the viewer's left) so it gives everything a skewed appearance. IOW, if it had been taken straight on, you'd see equal amounts of house on both sides of the front door. If you view it that way in your mind, that may help.

Remember when I said the top of the house was only 1/2 the size of the bottom, because the previous owner had "bumped out" a couple of walls? Well, this pic kind of shows it--such that, if you ran a flue up through one of the downstairs rooms, it would have to be near the "core" of the house, or else it would be out there in the breeze, and require mad amounts of bracing (or a pole?) to anchor it.... And because the "core" of the house (I'll explain) has two sets of stairs in it, it's all "high traffic" around the "core." The only place which has virtually no traffic is directly infront of the existing fireplace, to your extreme right as you face the pic. So it's not just economics making us think we can't have an inhouse flue, it's the fact that such a flue would bisect valuable space in the (small) rooms upstairs, and place the stove in high-traffic areas with little or no space for a woodpile.

If you walk straight in the front door, for 21', you'll be at the stairs. Look to your right, and your staring at the old fireplace, in front of which will go the stove. IOW, the fireplace is halfway into the depth of the house, on your right. (You can see the chimney in the upper, right side of the pic--that white, horizontal bar is at the top of the chimney.)

As you stand infront of the stairs, the stove will be about 8' from you, on your right.

Back outside for a minute. See the rooms on either side of the front door? That's actually all one, big room--consider it "left and right livingrooms." The one on your left is sitting partially on a slab, done to "bump out" that livingroom.

See the part of the house to the extreme, left rear of the pic? Where the only siding is visible on the first floor? That's the outermost corner of the diningroom. It's really cold because the backwall is almost all glass, it's entirely on a slab, and the insulation is even more lacking than the inadequate amount of baseboard heater-footage. Oh yeah...and it's got a 10' high cathedral ceiling....

Now, back inside, and walk 21' in. If, instead of going up the stairs, you jogged to your left, then continued back, you'd be walking along a row of cupboards (on your right) that form the back "wall" of the kitchen (12' long, containing the fridge and cupboards). These cupboards also form one side of what I explain below is the "core" of the house, a 12' deep x 6' wide center section that houses the upstairs staircase on one end, and the basement entranceway on the other end, and kitchen cupboards on one side.

Not to be redundant, but as I explain later in my post to Elk, below, but you could ride a bicycle around this "core" of the house. As you did, you'd go by a room that actually does have four walls and a door (always shut) which is on your right, at the rear of the house--the icecold diningroom is your left, at the rear of the house. (Actually, the foam insulation I put in to stop the draft did help a lot, but I may be being too generous, as this winter has been very mild compared to any I can remember, recently.

There is no wall separating the kitchen from the front rooms. If you keep walking back, you'll get to the diningroom, also all open.

If, on the other hand, you jogged right at the staircase, you'd pass through the "mini-room" where the fireplace is, across from the stairs, and keep walking back to an narrow, short hall formed by the side of the staircase and the bathroom, on your right. (The "core" of the house is between you and the kitchen). Make the left infront of the fifth room (the one we never open) and you're back in the kitchen, with the open diningroom on your right. Feel the chill?

Thanks, all.

 

[TruePatriot]

Garrett:

Re:

Insulate - Insulate - INSULATE.... did I mention insulation?

You should look into insulating the slabs from the outside, either a shallow wall or an umbrella style would help.

Other than that insulate and air seal everthing, then buy the big stove. I looked at the Morso 3610, but it was too large for my very well insulated very airtight 1600 sqft house. We bought the 2110 and it’s great.

If you need any insulation help feel free to ask here or by a private message.

Garett

Thank you for this. How does one insulate the slabs from the outside? If I wasn't clear, I apologize, but the remodeling of our house was completed by the previous owner. New vinyl siding on the outside, new wood floors over the slabs, new sheet rock.

Is it still possible to do the outside slab insulation? What is "shallow wall" and "umbrella-type" insulation? Approx. 4-8" of slab is visible, from the outside, before the vinyl siding starts.

Of course, while I say the previous owner "completed" the renovations, that's being generous. We always felt frozen in the "meat locker" (dining room) and one night, I put a candle down by the floor, because I just could not believe how much cold air was streaming past my feet (this room is on a slab). The candle almost blew out--it was that drafty! LOL I think we didn't notice it sooner because the air was leaking up from under and behind the tinwork of the baseboard heating than runs along one wall. IOW, we felt heat and cold coming from the same place, and it was confusing--obviously, we just weren't looking hard enough.

I pulled as much of that shrouding off as I could, and found a gap that ranged from 1/8" to 1/2", between the (ash?) flooring and the sheetrock behind the baseboard heating. I filled that gap with expanding foam and, in the process, found that the space seemed to extend down a good 6-8" or more. IOW, it seemed (to me) that it was insulation-free. The foam helped a lot, as it did eliminate the active draft, but I'm sure it's not considered "fully insulated" yet.

Interestingly, while the "meat locker" dining room is completely (I think) on a slab, the downstairs bedroom is not on a slab, as there is a 2 and 1/2' high crawlspace under that room. And part of it may be over the original basement. The basement has no access to this crawlspace, but i got in it through a blocked off "window" in the foundation. And cold air flows into the basement from the edges of both of these rooms. I thought I would jam up some of the paper-backed, fiberglas insulation, between the floor joists that form the basement ceiling, where the back wall of the basement abuts these two, cold rooms. Right now there's just some rocks and dirt jammed in between the floor joists, on top of the boulder wall of the basement.

And I appreciate your seconding the need for the large-size stove. Thanks again.
>

Marcia:

Because our second floor is only half the footprint of the downstairs, it really squeezes down our options of where to run a chimney "within the house's enevelope" but that was my first choice, for all the reasons you stated. I appreciate you relaying the experience that you could solve your routing problems with only two 45-degree bends and no significant draft loss. However, our other problem is that downstairs, every other location, other than directly in front of the existing fireplace, is really a "high traffic" area, meaning we'd have little room for the "wood wagon" I envision hauling the wood in with. As nice as your raised hearth is, even if I raise mine, I'm too lazy to shift the wood to underneath, from the wagon, and then drag it out for loading. I like the look but not the work of your under-hearth wood storage, and I'll quote Clint Eastwood's "Dirty Harry" character for support on this: "A man's gotta know his limitations...." :lol:

The fireplace is actually in it's own little "nook" and, happily, not far from the staircase. With a relatievely low (less than 8 foot) ceiling in this part, we're confident getting the air upstairs won't be a problem (though we may need to open floor registers, as I've stated, to get it from the staircase into the further bedrooms. We'll see.)

The only other place that's out of the way is the freezing diningroom (three outside walls, slab, inadequate insulation and inadequate baseboard footage). However, that's the room with the 3' tall "air dam" on the ceiling, and it's the furthest room from the center of the house. I'm afraid it would turn into an uninhabitable hothouse, even if my "Phase II" plans for a big, heat exchanger tube do work (against all odds).

So, yeah, we'll use the existing chimney, provided the inspection doesn't turn up any problems. I wish we could do what you did, because I would have welcomed the waste heat off of the chimney, (even through the double-wall pipe) in the second floor room, but there's just too many negatives for us, in our cool-looking (to us) but odd house.

I'm glad your placement worked out well--your method and result are exactly what we wanted to do but, unless the installer can see something we can't, it's not gonna happen like that for us.

What prompted you to say this:

And our draft seems TOO strong.

I mean, do you have a problem with over-firing? Do you have one of the old-style, in-flue dampers? I was wondering if they would be a good, added safety device, in the event that the stove sprung a leak, and began to over-fire....

Thanks again.
>

 

[TruePatriot]

UncleRich:

Re:

Peter, do you plan to run your boiler along with the stove?

We would like not to run it at all, though I know it will probably mean charging our baseboard heat with antifreeze of some type. That may be another year or two off, since we're not going to get much of a heating season in this year....

I'm thinking I wasn't clear enough in my original post, about the house already being "finished". The downstairs was fully remodelled, but just as obviously was not properly insulated and/or heated. (The upstairs was not remodeled in the circa 2000 redo...it does appear to have been remodelled once, I'm guessing in the '70's, based upon the mob-style panelling in the "den" which I kinda like anyway.)

So, I really like your radiant floor heating idea, for those slabs, but for the fact that it's not in the budget (as it would mean ripping up the finished, ash flooring) and, weird as it sounds, I think that the expansion of some rooms was done via pouring partial slabs around the existing (very small) basement, so that they could "bump out" the livingroom, for example. IOW, it looks cool from inside and out, and from the very straight and impressive sheetrock work and "shoring up" in the basement, (and installing an I-beam to make the "open plan") someone really knew what they were doing, but perhaps this wasn't the ideal house for this treatment, you know? I think they had a look they were going for, and got skilled professionals to do it "no matter what", and they did it. All except for the insulation-guy--maybe that wasn't in their budget? Or somebody just forgot about that aspect? They left the old cellulose insulation in the attic....

But as good as your idea is in theory, at this $tage, we lack the budget for radiant floor heat.

I do like your second stove idea. But…we rejected a wood stove for that room because, as that is an addition, with no second floor above it, it would require a God-awful amount of bracing to get the exhaust up above the quite-high second-story roof. (See pic in an earlier post, above). Honestly, I'd be afraid of it coming down in the global-warming-fueled hurricanes it seems we're in for, even in NYS. Now...does a pellet stove not require the same height chimney as a woodstove? If not, I can see your idea makes a lot of sense...but I'd have to get around my innate cheapness in not wanting to buy pellets when we've got a source of 100% free firewood. My g.f. talked of simply closing off the "meat locker" with an insulated curtain, if need be, but the pellet stove is something to think about--thanks!

Your shop floor sounds like it's gonna be way more comfortable than our dining room-go for it!

Are your ceilings coffered? Give us a better description, I can’t get a handle on the “odd cathedral” concept. My thought was with high ceilings, lots of multi-speed reversible ceiling fans. Moving the warm air away from the ceiling will allow better movement. Have you thought of using vents through the walls or transoms above the doors that will allow air to move? They’d be cool in a home of that age. Or even turning doorways into arches extending higher than normal doorways. Victorian homes with 10-12 ft ceiling had very tall doors exactly to do this, move the warm air from room to room, or keep it in one area.

You know, I wasn't familiar with the concept of "coffered ceilings" but I do know what a "coffer dam" is (Can you tell I watch the History Channel's "Modern Marvels" where they show things like damming off the rivers to pour the bridge abutments? LOL) Then I looked them up--our ceilings are not "coffered" per se but, where the rooms used to be divided (in our "open plan" downstairs) there is usually what I'll call "an upside-down parapet" or partial wall, extending downward from the ceilding, say 1' to 3'. IOW, there is a big "air dam" extending down from the ceilings, along the lines where dividing walls used to be. These air dams block air from flowing at the ceiling-level, I believe.

Picture this: our "meat locker" of a dining room has a rather impressive, "barn-style" configuration to the sheetrock in the cathedral ceiling. IOW, the room's ceiling is not rectangular, nor is it an A-frame. The room has vertical walls, which then make a 45 degree, inward slope, then level off, to form the ceiling, like the general shape of a classic barn. Well, what I called an "odd style cathedral ceiling" or an "upside-down parapet" is this 3 foot tall wall, EXTENDING DOWN FROM THE CEILING, on the kitchenside of the diningroom (remember, open plan, now) to a height of about 8'. IOW, it's a HUGE AIR DAM, which would capture any heat in that room and prevent it from passing along the 10' high ceiling into the 8' high kitchen. In other rooms, the "upside-down air dams" are approx. 1' "high".

Yes, I had thought of using vents through the walls, particularly in the "upside down air dam" that is over the hall that runs from where the stove would be, to the cold dining room. I thought I'd put a squirrel cage fan in that wall, and run my big air tube from their, around the corner, 18' to the dining room, and then exhaust it near the floor. We also are considering cutting holes in the ceilings/floors, like the old farmhouses had, to make passive "registers." I'd be surprised if this house didn't already have them, (since covered over) and at some point, I'll try to figure out how to find them.

That's interesting about the tall doors in old, Victorian homes--I didn't know that. We don't have ceilings that high (other than a couple cathedrals) but since we don't have many walls, we don't have many doors--lol. My grandmother had one of those windows over the "door transoms" like you described, however--your description sheds more light on that now--thanks!
>

 

[TruePatriot]

Elkmon:

I'll go out on a limb--never has one, short Elk-sentence generated a 6,000 character response, but here goes:

In re: to the part of my post where I said:

Basically, I want to suspend a 12” pipe up near the ceiling by the woodstove, and run it down the hall and around one corner, for a total run of 18’. I plan to use a thermostatically-controlled squirrel cage fan. The pipe will be level, and in the warm air near the ceiling, so I figure it has a chance of working. I plan on having it exhaust at floor level, into the cold

You said:

No air duct return can be within 10’ of the stove. supply without an engineered returns is useless many have tried few have suceeded. What safety features have you factored in?

Because you know this biz like the back of your hand, you (no offense) sometimes communicate in "short-hand," I think. Or, maybe I'm just a little slow, and have trouble keeping up.

So I'm gonna try to impersonate M.C. Hammer and "break this down" so I can be sure I understand you.

When you say

supply without an engineered returns is useless many have tried few have suceeded.

Are you saying that if I only run ONE tube, from the hot stove zone, to the cold diningroom zone, then I will not get a continuous flow of hot air, unless I also run a (powered) return tube, from the cold to the hot?

Because if I do understand you, I'd like to explain why I think that rule may not apply here.

Please try to picture the downstairs of our house. It's an "open plan" design, and essentially square, with four "rooms" arrayed around a central "core" containing the staircase. This "core" is just about 12' x 6'. (There's actually a fifth room with a real door and 4 walls, but let's ignore that--we keep it closed). The dining room's open to the kitchen, and because it's real wall is almost all glass, it forms the Siberian quadrant, let's say.

I'll make it easier: You could ride a bicycle around the house, if you can make really sharp turns. (I have to put my hands on the wall, riding the bicycle, when I make the corner where I want to run the 18' "air tube." But I have really wide bars on my bike....)

The staircase is actually part of a rectangular "core" in the center of the house. The "core" has sheetrock on one side and the other side is the back "wall" of our kitchen--it's not really a "wall" because it doesn't connect to anything--rather, it's 12' of cupboards and fridge.

The woodstove would be approx. 8' from the staircase, on the side opposite the "cupboard wall" in the kitchen, in a small "room" on the side of the house opposite the kitchen. In other words, when standing in the kitchen, looking at the center of the house, you can't see the stove because it's on the opposite side of the "core" of the house (the stairs), and 8' from the stairs.

My Plan: I thought the air-transfer tube, powered by a powerful squirrel cage fan, could set up a flow of air around the perimeter of the house. In other words, the air would be "tubed" from the small stove "room," through the 18' long tube, (with one 90-degree turn), around the corner behind the "core/stairs," where the tube stops, and air exits into the diningroom. From there, I hoped the air would fill the dining room and flow back into the kitchen, and on through to the left and right front living rooms, (as it's all open) and back into the stove zone, negating the need for a cold air return.

The tube would only transfer the hot air for the first 18' away from the stove, through the tightest part of the house (a narrow hall behind the "core", across the front of the room we don't open) spilling out into the diningroom. From there, I was hoping the warm air would push the cooler air around the house, back to toward the stove, to be warmed again. Flowing the same way you'd ride a bicycle around the house--slow but steady.

Does my scenario even apply to what you said, about needing a could air return, where the house is essentially open, with no doors or doorways?

Now, when you said this:

No air duct return can be within 10’ of the stove.

Does that apply ONLY to a cold-air return duct? IOW, if I go against your advice, and ONLY have one duct, does the 10' rule still apply?

Interestingly, the hot air duct would be approx. 9-10' from the stove, where it would pick up the hot air, near the ceiling in the small, two-sided stove "room."

Now, when you say

What safety features have you factored in?

I must admit...nuthin'.

However, reading your other posts, I saw mention made once of some sort of CO-sensor-driven relay that would shut down the circ. fan in my duct.

Is there also one that would be temperature-sensor driven?

Do I need either of these?

How much are these? I know a CO alarm is approx. $50-60. And it must have a relay, for the fan motor. So...don't tell me--$300./per? And I need both a temp. and CO shutdown for it?

Or, if I'm way off, what should I be thinking about for "safety features?" (Please don't say a marine-approved Halon fire suppression system--please?).

Now, re: this:

many have tried few have suceeded

I'll admit that your apocolyptic tone here does serve to warn me off, like an ancient legend (just kiddin'--I'm just pokin' fun) but can you tell me about the "few" who "have succeeded?" Did they, perchance, have an open-plan house?

Thanks for your time on this point--even though it's not happening this year I am very interested in whether my air tube has a chance of working--it's failure could result in me finding a new place to live....

Peter

 

[elkimmeg]

Little pressed for time now But promise to read over all concerns and try to answer them and provide alternatives.
Stzart thinking with your high ceilings how to draw the heat deposit there at the top down into your normal confort zone. There is a reason Thermostats are placed where they are, about 54" off the floor on an interior wall.. This is the normal confort zone Having 2' higher creates a much larger heating Vollume to be heated. One has to move the upper heat into your confort zone.
Ceiling fans can accomplish that. If one places a duct using mechanical means to remove that heat that means lees will be there to reach you confort zone in the room/ rooms of the stove.
Please set realistic goals stoves are room /zone heaters. Till I all your concerns and re read them and understand of what your are attempting and asking I can not add much more now

I will tell you return or air extraction code wise can not be within 10 of the combustion fired appliance due to combustion air requirements and safety concerns the ability to back draft it introducing co /co/2" into the living space and the forced duct als is an excellerated path to spread such toxic gases especially to a space when we are most vunderable sleeping.