Another Ranch basement circulateing question!

I have a 1300sqft ranch with a 1100sqft basement. Block walls non-finished basement, DS1600 stove is at one end of basement and stairway is at oposite end with upstairs door open. Heat raises to end of house with stairway open, but does not make it back towards 2/3rds of living space. Three bedrooms are at other end of house, my wife and my bedroom gets heated at end of house because stove is directley underneath of us, but does not reach 2 other bedrooms. I just installed a cold air return in farthest corner of coldest bedroom (corner of house). I ran a a cold air return pipe to basement (6in off floor). I could feel a slight pull and a lighter varified it. Tried that for 2 days, no better. I then installed an inline 6in fan, that really pulled the cold air to basement, but with no difference in heat in that room!
For the past 2 nights I removed pipe going to basement and installed fan at floor forcing hot air from basement to bed room. It has not been that cold out, but it does seem to blow warm air into room and temps have gone up well in bedroom. Of course now it sounds like an aircraft is landing in bedroom This did help, but it still dose not get heat out of basement and into living area/bedrooms as needed. We are still getting a 5-7deg. temp differnce at house ends.
PS- I have hardwood floors so before cutting, I am trying to make right moves

Welcome RR....Im new here as well...
Any chance of you posting a rough sketch of your floorplan?
I think i get the idea...but a drawing might help.
...but heres my two cents
...the volume of warm air that your stairwell will allow to rise up out of it will certainly need more than one 6 inch cold air return tomake "room" for that heat upstairs...especially rooms with out a direct supply of warm air (like your 2nd and 3rd bedrooms)
...cold air or more speciffically-RETURN air in my oppinion..is your biggest obstacle here.
You may be better off piping HEAT to each bdrm. via duct and/or fans...and let the stair well be the return air "dump"....
Either way you will be spinning your wheels trying to "push" heat into a room without some means of evacuating cooler (low) air out of it...just my two cents
Hope this helps....and remember...if you decided to pipe "heat" to those rooms...place the vent on OUTSIDE walls (the coldest)....and return vents on inside...or central areas
...hope this helps

Rigar wrote:Welcome RR....Im new here as well...
Any chance of you posting a rough sketch of your floorplan?
I think i get the idea...but a drawing might help.
...but heres my two cents
...the volume of warm air that your stairwell will allow to rise up out of it will certainly need more than one 6 inch cold air return tomake "room" for that heat upstairs...especially rooms with out a direct supply of warm air (like your 2nd and 3rd bedrooms)
...cold air or more speciffically-RETURN air in my oppinion..is your biggest obstacle here.
You may be better off piping HEAT to each bdrm. via duct and/or fans...and let the stair well be the return air "dump"....
Either way you will be spinning your wheels trying to "push" heat into a room without some means of evacuating cooler (low) air out of it...just my two cents
Hope this helps....and remember...if you decided to pipe "heat" to those rooms...place the vent on OUTSIDE walls (the coldest)....and return vents on inside...or central areas
...hope this helps

All good advice and on target. I would like to add that a 5-7 degree end to end temp difference on your set up, with the stove on one end is not all that bad. I guess what I'm saying RR, is that because your set up is not ideal, you will probably never get totally even heating through out. I'm not saying it couldn't be better but even in my house where the chimneys are inside the house almost right in the middle (roof peak line) and with my big stove in the center of the house, there are still 5 degree variations in some areas. My house has floor registers in about 75% of the rooms too. There is a reason that furnaces and boilers became popular and their ability to deliver to individual rooms/areas is it. It's always a bit of a compromise with any "space heater".

RR, I apologize in advance for the long post but wanted to explain my setup in detail in the hopes it could help you out. I have a similar situation as you and here is how I tackled my problem. I have a 1200 sq.ft. 3 bedroom ranch with an unfinished basement. The stove is located in one corner of my house, but on the 1st floor not in the basement! Our bedrooms are located on the other end of the house. The bedrooms were always cold unless the stove was cranking, then they were bearable! The thermostat is located in the middle of the house, just in reach of the stoves heat to keep it off. Not the most ideal setup but thats how it was when we bought the house. Works out great now, I gate off the room with the stove from curious little fingers! I installed a 12 x 12 intake with a filter in the room with the stove. I ran flexible duct with an 8" inline fan through my attic and dropped a supply vent in all 3 bedrooms and the bathroom (everything located on the opposite side of the house from the stove). Wired the fan into a switch and presto. House stays very comfy with about 5-7 degree difference from end to end. Better than the 10+ degree difference we had! I don't need to run my stove as hard now to get the entire house warm. I don't have a return nor do I need one. The 8" fan I am using has plenty of pull to get the cool air back to the room with the stove, even with the doors closed. Probably could've went with a smaller fan. I matched the fan to the amount of air I was trying to move. Not very noisy at all, just a slight hum. A lot of people doubted this would work, but I was surprised how well it does work. I got the idea from a friend who had a similar problem with his fireplace insert. I realize your stove is in the basement. If heat soaking the floors isn't enough to keep the 1st floor warm then you need to move the warm air out of the basement somehow. Since heat rises I would cut floor vents in the rooms you are trying to heat. Warm air should push up through the vents while cool air sinks into the basement to get heated by the stove. Hope my situation helped. Good luck!

Agreed to all. rr, that 5* difference will be greatly equalized if as stated, you put a vent in each room--not perfect but you'll be at optimum. They make some nice looking floor vents that are closeable/adjustable. My experience says to keep the vents near inside walls, at least that's what works well in my house--just a couple examples & their just ones I drug out of the barn.

freetown fred wrote:Agreed to all. rr, that 5* difference will be greatly if as stated, you put a vent in each room--not perfect but you'll be at optimum. They make some nice looking floor vents that are closeable/adjustable. My experience says to keep the vents near inside walls, at least that's what works well in my house--just a couple examples & their just ones I drug out of the barn.

That first one is similar to the ones in my house Fred except mine are black. They have the louvers on them to open or close and now that you mention it, they are all near inside walls or close to the chimneys too.

I don't have a return nor do I need one. "

actually...you do. Your entire 1st level (where your stove is located)...is acting to a degree as awarm/cold loop...(for lack of a better word)
The inline fan you are utilizing above your stove is drawing the exact amount of air into the heated room as it is distributing to the other three (or four?). Period.
RR s biggest difference is that the stove is located below the living space in which he is trying to keep comfortable. The rising hot air will essentially be in conflict with the falling cooler air...all within his stairwell.
Your "system" inproved the comfort level in the cold rooms by "forcing" warm ir into a cooler space...while also providing an unobstructed avenue for return air to make its way back to your stove...which i woul assume in your case is the hallway
...it was also not uncommon for older homes to have a cold air returns located against outside walls... this is not efficient by design....and putting heat vents against colder walls ( walls with windows and doors) makes absolute scientific...and common sense.

Just saying that the vents work real well on the inside wallls in this 200 yr old 2600 sq farm house. AND, don't get me started on useing scientific & common sense in the same sentence.

ridgeracing wrote:I have a 1300sqft ranch with a 1100sqft basement. Block walls non-finished basement, DS1600 stove is at one end of basement and stairway is at oposite end with upstairs door open.
PS- I have hardwood floors so before cutting, I am trying to make right moves

...Hey Goldie locks you been heating in my house Wow same set up different stove, now, do you have any wall to wall carpet? Hmmmmm. carpet and padding big insulator huge difference and to prove my point. My stove is below my 2 bedrooms son's room no carpet floor toasty room nice. My bedroom wall to wall floor ok and I can feel temp difference in the air between the 2 rooms. I noticed when I get in bed the bed is toasty because of the direct contact with the floor---RADIANT----brilliant. If your house is like mine you may have a linen closet in the very CENTER of the house and that is where my return air is and I am in he process of increasing the hole and fan in the base of the linen closet floor. By sucking the cooler air from the center of the home I am getting heated air up the 2 vents, one in each bedroom and also at the opposite end of the house stairwell like your home. I installed vents from home depot made buy tru-aire, they are 18"long x 4 1/2" tall and 3" wide, they go against the wall at the baseboard and the slot in the floor near the wall is only 3"x 14" close to the wall and you walk past them not on them. I am assuming the cieling joists in the basement are free of insulation as well, if not remove and put some at the rim joint. good luck mike.

FF, I had a friend of mine who is an hvac tech help me install my system. He placed the vents on the inside walls, I think so the flexible run wasn't so long...the job was free and he was probably just trying to save some green. He had some doubt it would work! I couldn't be happier. Rigar, never thought about my setup as a loop. Just figured I didn't have a direct return, but in a way I do! Thanks for the knowledge my friend.

freetown fred wrote:Just saying that the vents work real well on the inside wallls in this 200 yr old 2600 sq farm house. AND, don't get me started on useing scientific & common sense in the same sentence.

...lol !
....youre right Fred...that is a contradiction !!

Thanks for all replies, work in progress!

dont no how well this will show, Sorry

I think this pic shows better.

Hello RR! My home is setup almost exactly like yours... except, I have an additional 12 feet of 1st floor living... was added on during original construction... it has crawl space under it... my full basement size is 30 x 48, and the first floor is 30 x 60. I was having the same exact problem you are.... I installed 2 - 6" in duct fans... into my old cold air returns. I have them just pulling the cold air, down into the open basement... WORLD of difference! 1 on each end of the house... and leave them run! It takes about 3 or 4 days for all the temps in my home to level off.... move the air in your home. it will help!