Moving Heat Around

My stove heats two-thirds of the house very nicely. But the other third connects via a 4 by 6 foot hallway, where the doors into and out of the hallway are at right angles to each other. Way too little heat diffuses through on its own. I could put a fan through a wall to push directly into the other room, but I fear it would make a lot of noise itself, plus the opening would make for kitchen/dining room noise directly into the living room. I would like to be able to push heat through the hall, without unpleasant fan noise. I have seen pictures of fans that mount in the upper corner of a door frame. Are they noisy? Are they effective?

Thanks for any suggestions....

rberq wrote:My stove heats two-thirds of the house very nicely. But the other third connects via a 4 by 6 foot hallway, where the doors into and out of the hallway are at right angles to each other. Way too little heat diffuses through on its own. I could put a fan through a wall to push directly into the other room, but I fear it would make a lot of noise itself, plus the opening would make for kitchen/dining room noise directly into the living room. I would like to be able to push heat through the hall, without unpleasant fan noise. I have seen pictures of fans that mount in the upper corner of a door frame. Are they noisy? Are they effective?

Thanks for any suggestions....

Can you describe your setup a bit more?
Where is the stove?
How many levels?
that kind of thing

Your best bet is to try to move the cold air, as it's more dense. .. the hot air will follow, to fill the vacated area. IMHO

rberq wrote:I have seen pictures of fans that mount in the upper corner of a door frame. Are they noisy? Are they effective

I have one & I don't mind it but I do have a stoker stove which drowns out the door frame fan. I would try it & if its too loud return it. Got mine at Home Depot.

Thanks for the suggestions. I had read that moving the cold air works better, but I wasn't sure why -- higher density explains it. The trouble is, that would mean putting fans at the bottom of the door frame where people would trip over them.

As "the devil" says, "give us some more details".
Can you take the cold air to the basement and bring it back to the stove? etc.

rberq wrote:Thanks for the suggestions. I had read that moving the cold air works better, but I wasn't sure why -- higher density explains it. The trouble is, that would mean putting fans at the bottom of the door frame where people would trip over them.

What you want to do if possible is run a return air duct from the furthest place in that cold room back to the stove. That will help draw warm air down the hall way to the colder part of the house. You want to pull the warm air.

I'll give you my setup and maybe you can adapt it to your house.

My house is one floor on a slab so I had to run ducting throught the attic. I have a register in the ceiling directly above the stove. In the attic is a 14"x14"x14" sheetmetal box. That has 2 trunks coming off of it, one to my family room, one to another similar box halfway down the house. Before the second box, there is a small inline fan. The second box feeds 3 bedrooms through 4"x8" registers in the ceilings. As long as the doors stay open, that "heat conveyor" works perfectly. If the living room where the stove is, is 72-74*, the bedrooms will be around 68*.

This system has been the best thing I've ever done as far as this stove is concerned.

jpete wrote:I'll give you my setup and maybe you can adapt it to your house.

My house is one floor on a slab so I had to run ducting throught the attic. I have a register in the ceiling directly above the stove. In the attic is a 14"x14"x14" sheetmetal box. That has 2 trunks coming off of it, one to my family room, one to another similar box halfway down the house. Before the second box, there is a small inline fan. The second box feeds 3 bedrooms through 4"x8" registers in the ceilings. As long as the doors stay open, that "heat conveyor" works perfectly. If the living room where the stove is, is 72-74*, the bedrooms will be around 68*.

This system has been the best thing I've ever done as far as this stove is concerned.

How much insulation do you have wrapped around your attic ducts? (I would think it would be tough to keep stove warmed air warm enough to travel through a cold attic to warm distant rooms?)

I have a 9 inch fan installed in the top corner of my doorway and it moves most of the heat down to the end of my 85' ranch. The name of it is Lakewood High Velocity Fan 9 Inch, 3 speed but I only use the 1st speed. No noise at all, only a small amount of wind sound. I bought mine at walmart but sure you could find them other places.

The best advice you have had is to pull the cold air from the furthest part of the cold bedrooms, and duct the air from that point to the stove in the basement.

I'll add to that: put the duct right on the inlet to the distribution fan of the stove. This will provice a positive draw of cold air from the bedrooms, and create a circulation loop. The circulation loop is vital to have even cooling. Your stove will be reheating air from the bedrooms, which is warmer than the air off the floor of the basement, so the stove will be more efficient as well.

Simple dryer ducting is all that is needed, you don't need to spend a lot of insulated ductwork unless you run the duct through unheated crawlspaces or attics.

Greg L.

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In reply to a couple questions, my stove is in the LR, heats that room and the adjacent bedroom, heat goes up the stairs and heats a hall and two bedrooms on the second floor. That all works surprisingly well, didn't have to do anything special except keep the doors open to the rooms I want to heat. But the area I can't get the heat to is on the same floor as the LR, in an ell. Not practical to route either hot or cold air through the cellar because of the layout, nor through the attic. It sounds like the best I can do is one of those fans in the corner of the doorframe. I'll be pushing the warmer air, not quite as efficient as pushing cold, but better than nothing.

You can try the fan in the doorway, blowing either direction. Perhaps blowing "out" of the BRs will work better. Trial and error.

Devil5052 wrote:How much insulation do you have wrapped around your attic ducts? (I would think it would be tough to keep stove warmed air warm enough to travel through a cold attic to warm distant rooms?)

The ducting is that insulated flexible HVAC stuff. The sheetmetal boxes are wrapped in kraft faced pink fiberglass.

jpete wrote:

Devil5052 wrote:How much insulation do you have wrapped around your attic ducts? (I would think it would be tough to keep stove warmed air warm enough to travel through a cold attic to warm distant rooms?)

The ducting is that insulated flexible HVAC stuff. The sheetmetal boxes are wrapped in kraft faced pink fiberglass.

Sounds like you got it insulated very well. Might be interesting though to take a thermometer & measure the heat level at the ceiling box (above the stove) & then what the temp of the air coming out at the furthest vent in the house & see how much you are losing.