To move air upstairs I have been using a box fan from the top of the stairs in pic 3 blowing the cold air down which brings the temp diff from 8 to 4 (wife hates when I do this). Would I be better off using the whole house fan in pic 4 and 5 for a couple min to get the hot air moving up then shut it down or would heat loss be too great? Otherwise Im going to throw insulation over the top of it and close it down for the winter. Thanks guys!
I would cover that whole house fan. Heat loss there can be huge. Can you put a ceiling fan in the top of the stairwell? Put on winter mode, it will pull up the warm air and mix it with all the surround air upstairs. The cooler floor air will tumble down the stairs. A small box fan sat at the bottom of the stairs and run on low will pull a huge amount of air down those stairs. Warm air replaces the cooling air. We heat this way. The bedrooms are cooler on really cold days. But the central open areas are within 3 degrees on both levels. Don't run the fans on high. The draft will make the area uncomfortable.
K I had already thrown a couple layers of insulation over it and so it will stay. I do have ceiling fans in all three upper bedrooms, do you think all three of these fans running would create enough suction coupled with the box fan on low?
Its a suction fan, in the summer when the fan is on any open windows will feel like there is a box fan in them blowing into the room. This thing creates a TON of suction!! So my thought was that with all windows closed it would suck the warm air up the stairs but now that I think about it, it will probably suck all air, warm and cold up, and mess up the flow that the box fan at the top of the stairs creates plus the amount of heat loss threw that huge thing being un-insulated. If I get desperate as the cold sets in I might give it a shot.
Whole house fans exhaust out the attic....do they not? Huge heat loss. I know when the bathroom fan is on with that door closed or slightly ajar, there is a very large volume of air being pulled into that room and out. Whole house fan is much stronger. Try it and post results.
I will wait for a colder day with a bigger heat difference between the two floors. Right now its about 4 difference due to the mild weather and me keeping the stove running 24/7, Id rather keep the house overly warm than heat from cold
Running the whole house fan is a bad idea, it would just be exhausting your hard earned heat to be replaced by cold outside air. If your house is tight enough, the fan might mess with your stoves draft or even reverse it. Not something I would care to have happen. A good solution might be to get a single return floor register into the furthest upstairs bedroom with a small fan pulling air down. Thus creating a circular flow. Making that visually appealing could be difficult, I have thought about trying it in my house but the closets do not line up and I don't want a vent in the middle of the dining room ceiling
Subscribing to this thread. I'm in the process of moving from a ranch to a 2 story home so I'll be looking at good ways to get the heat upstairs. Might try a small fan blowing down the steps and see if that gets some circulation gowing.
Works for us. We have a tri level, with the stove in the lower part. You can feel the air current when walking up and down the stairs. I just installed a ceiling fan down there recently. Looking forward to seeing what it can do also.
DO NOT TRY A WHOLE HOUSE EXAUST FAN!!!! It created a HUGE backpuff and now my house smells like smoke! This was a TERRIBLE idea!!
