Ready to Pull the Trigger

[Komatsu350]

Based off of opinions and arguments found here and other places I have finally narrowed my insert list down to 3, the Blaze King Princess, Buckstove model 80, and Buckstove model 91. My fireplace can accept any of the 3 and I will be installing a stainless steel insulated liner with it. The fireplace is on the main floor and I'm not super worried about keeping the basement warm, I have a pellet stove down there to use if we will be using the basement. I have a cold air return on wall directly across from fireplace so I plan on using furnace fan to circulate heat. Im not totally positive on what I need as far as heat output or what stove would fit the home application best?, any help or opinions would be fantastic.
Here are some house details: 1500sqft ranch with a 1500sqft finished basement, Cathedral ceilings in living room, dinning room, and kitchen, bedroom area of the house is standard 8' ceilings, Basement is open floor plan with 1 utility room and 1 bathroom poured concrete walls, full attic with blown insulation about 16" deep, 2 ceiling fans in same room as fireplace as well as cold air return, house is in full sun from sunrise to 3-4pm, built in 1994 with standard construction, good insulation and windows, Located in southwest Ohio with 0-20 degree overnight occasionally negatives and daytime highs 20-35 degrees with occasional weeks not leaving teens. Like to keep most of the house 67-70 degrees and have pellet stove an propane backup.

 

[rwhite]

All seems like a good plan other than using the furnace fan to circulate heat, Most folks, myself included, have found this doesn't work well. Mainly because of the the temps and fan speed your working with. With a furnace you are taking 1500+ degree air and moving it and it's coming out the ducts at 90. Now imagine taking 70 degree air and doing the same thing. I can have my 1st floor at 75 and turn on my furnace blower and in a short amount of time have the whole house at 65.

 

[Komatsu350]

Wow I never even considered that, makes sense tho, in that case im worried how well the heat will travel down the hall way thru the 7ft door out of a room with cathedral ceilings. Will the 2 ceiling fans help enough to keep the air down?

 

[begreen]

For more even heat in the house put a table or box fan at the far end of the hallway, placed on the floor, pointing toward the woodstove. Run it 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.

Another option is a bit more complicated and involves running an insulated duct under the floor with the intakes in the far bedroom floor, tied to a duct that blows out into the stove room. A quiet inline remote bath fan works well for this. The cool air will be replaced with warm air from the stove room. This will require that the bedroom doors be normally open or at least have a 1" gap under the door or a grille in the door to allow circulation.