Wood stoves have a long history. Because of its many advantages, many families prefer wood stoves to electric heaters. Wood stoves produce real flames, unlike electric heaters that simulate a flame. As a result, you can receive heat across the entire room by ducting the heat that your wood stove emits.
Adding a duct for wood stove heat distribution is a practical solution for keeping your house warm and eliminating all cold air without utilizing a traditional central heating system. It’s possible that trying to connect ducting to a wood stove isn’t the best idea. There are inherent fire risks, and many manufacturers will expressly state that you should not do this.
So, what can you do if you have a wood stove and want to duct heat for heat distribution and circulate heat around your house fast and safely? In our guide, you can learn more about effective wood-burning stove hot air ducting and how to do it safely. By the end, you’ll see how effective it can be to use pellet stoves to spread the heat around all the rooms in your house. (Learn How To Remove Baseboard Heater)
How Do I Circulate The Heat From My Wood Stove?
Although you can connect a wood stove fan to your central heating’s existing ductwork, experts warn that this practice poses a fire concern, not to mention smoke in your ducting, which is dangerous and can affect other rooms.
Install wood stove ducting and use a wood stove duct fan to benefit from the warm air from the stove.
Rather than sending warmed air into a distant room, this method draws cold air from distant rooms toward your wood stove; thus, you can avoid heating your duct with hot air from your wood stove.
Directly connecting your wood stove fan to your central heating ducts is dangerous. To get started with the duct fan method, you’ll need to create a ceiling vent in a distant room.
Connect the wood stove ductwork to the stove and run it through the ceiling. Install a wood stove duct fan at the end of the duct, angled to draw air through the duct.
Warm air is released from your wood stove as cold air passes. This warm air may heat your home and is a significant source of warmth in the winter.
If the fan is not freestanding in a fireplace, you can mount it over your stove. A fan of this design helps force the heat up and out, making your whole house feel warm. To further help with circulation, you can use oscillating fans to help distribute heat from your pellet stove.
Other Warm Air Circulation Options
Another alternative for circulation is a plug-in blower, which functions similarly to a fan system. Such a plug-in blower takes heat directly from the stove and directs it in the direction you want.
Can You Duct A Wood Heater?
Using a duct to work cold air is safer and more efficient for your wood stove ductwork.
Attempting to duct warm air from a wood stove to a distant room will only heat the duct, losing most of the heat in the process. This type of heat distribution is inefficient.
Even if installing ducting takes a little effort and simple tools, most handy individuals should be able to handle it.
Install a ceiling vent, connect the duct, and run the bottom end toward your wood stove.
Place a fan at the duct’s end close to your pellet stove to blow air through it.
A fan at the duct’s end will start drawing cold air across the wood stove, releasing more warm air from the stove and aiding airflow throughout the home. (Read Pellet Stove Vs Propane)
In addition, think of your flu as ducting; you are ducting heat, not cool air.
How Do I Circulate The Heat From My Wood Stove Upstairs?
When hot air from a wood stove rises up the flue and heats the heating tubes inside the heat exchanger, the heat exchanger operates.
The flue is being used to duct heat from the wood stove, and the heat exchanger is being used to remove the heat from the flue.
The best results will be obtained by using a fan to move air through the heat exchanger. A fan assists in two ways. First, cool air passing over a warm heat exchanger releases heat from the heat exchanger into the air.
A fan aids in the setup of airflow circulation throughout a home. For example, the ideal way for heating multiple rooms with a wood stove is to circulate air.
You can put it closer to the floor if you’re installing a heat exchanger in a room above the wood stove. Then, as the rising hot air cools, the flue’s end becomes cooler.
Connect your wood stove closer to your heat exchanger to spread heat. The second reason for placing the heat exchanger closer to the ground is that hot air rises, and you want to gain the many benefits and direct the warm air to where you are.
Combining a heat exchanger with ducting for multi-story homes is a fantastic alternative. Setting up ducting to suck in cold air and then directing that cold air through the wood stove heat exchanger could be a far more efficient setup for moving air through a multi-story house.
Can A Wood Stove Heat An Entire House?
Leaks can cause quick heat loss and a lack of airflow, resulting in a considerable loss in your wood stove’s energy efficiency.
Due to too much pressure being exerted to the system during the winter months, if the ducts are not insulated, they will collapse on themselves. If utilized with air conditioners throughout the summer, the same thing could happen.
Seal any gaps detected between floors and walls with spray foam insulation, caulk, or other sealants to create an airtight barrier around your home’s heating system.
How to Duct More Heat from a Wood Burning Stove?
Installing insulated ducts to absorb and transport heat from your wood stove into your home is the first stage in ducting heat from a wood-burning stove.
If your copper or aluminum coils are bare or unprotected, insulate them with fiberglass or aluminum tape, and seal the ducting of your wood stove using foil or fiberglass insulation tape to keep the heat from fleeing your house.
Then, while you’re heating your wood stove, you’ll need to circulate an air return, which will allow heated air to be brought into your home and circulated around the house.
The hot air produced by burning wood in your wood stove will move through copper pipes, but it will require a route to enter the house efficiently. This is when a return air system comes in handy.
Install a vent in each room to allow cold air from the outside to enter and mix with hot air from your wood stove. A cold breeze from outside may feel wonderful on hot summer days, but it will cause your wood stove to lose heat.
You’ll need cold air from outside and hot air from inside to mix and circulate throughout the house to get the most out of your wood stove. (Read Are Howard Miller Clocks Valuable)
Seal all holes around doors and windows to prevent warm air from escaping outdoors when it’s colder outside than inside during the winter months. If you live in a home that faces the sun, this procedure is essential.
Finally, make sure that any air vents on top of your stove pipe are closed. Make that hot air from your wood-burning stove does not escape into the atmosphere.
Preventive Measures
If you’re unsure how much heat is being lost, put an infrared thermometer there. A thermometer will show you how hot or cold it is. You can also measure areas of the most heat loss and where to place insulation.
Check Ducts for Air Leaks
The volume of air lost through duct cracks varies depending on the size of the leak and the speed of air flow. Touch the ceiling while standing near an air vent, then compare the sensation to touching the same location when standing near a wood stove’s pipe leak.
If the area where the air comes out of the ceiling seems cooler, there is a significant issue in your ducts that needs to be addressed. To fix these issues and more, you can install insulation as above.
These need replacing if you have worn out parts around joints or elbows.
One thing to note is the pressure inside your duct. It can affect your heating performance if it is too high or too low.
Connect Woodstove To Central Air Ducts
The best choice for heating your home, especially multi-level, will be to connect your wood stove to the central heating ducts. This works like an electric heater and keeps every room in your house warm.
Your wood stove would need to be next to the furnace for this to work. This is so that the fan can supply the plenum with warm air and ducting heat to where you want it.
If you have rooms such as kitchens and bathrooms you can’t easily use these methods, think about radiant floor heating.
What You Need
- Awl
- Tape Measure
- Ducting pieces
- Inline Duct Wood Stove Fan
- Tin Snips
- Marker pen
- Screwdriver
- 1-inch, self-tapping sheet metal screws
- Starting collar
- Leather gloves
Also, use either metal tape or mastic to wrap seams followed by insulation to cover the ductwork. This helps with maximum heat transfer.
Take Measurements
Measure six inches down from the plenum’s top. Use a tape measure to improve your reading.
Your starting collar should be six inches high. Don’t mount the collar on the plenum. End-up the collar on the plenum, and then using a marker, trace the outside diameter onto the sheet metal.
Pierce The Plenum
After taking your measurements, poke a hole in your plenum with your awl where the line was drawn.
Cut the hole with tin snips, and then pull the plenum top off. If it won’t come off, remove any sheet metal screws keeping it in place.
Insert Collar
Take your starting collar and insert it into the hole. Reach inside the plenum to bend the tabs from the collar to help hold the collar in position.
Attach Duct Work
Attach your inline stove fan to your ductwork using the sheet metal screws and fasten these where the seams meet. (Read Magic Eraser Water Stains Ceiling)
Operate Your Fan As Your Wood Stove Burns
The duct fan propels the warm air from the stove into the plenum when you turn on the fan to ignite the fire. The heat is uniformly distributed throughout the wood furnace duct system by the plenum.
