Okay so the short question is how do you move heat from your stove around??? Mine is centrally located and I use the ceiling fan...I don't have a blower on my Fisher so I use the ceiling fan. Just have a one story/ranch. I know there is both radiant heat and convection heat that will naturally come off a stove. I have heard some people say put a fan behind the stove and have it blow outwards...some say aim a fan at the stove...??? Of course a lot has to do with room size, door locations, one vs two stories. Personally I thought a blower on the stove was too noisy. And for me I think the ceiling fan does a good job....now with putting on an addition next year I am starting to think ahead a little. I don't really want to add a second stove...well, yeah I do, I just don't want to spend money on another chimney...lol Thanks.!
The best way (imo...) is to not blow very hard; the turbulence from that mixes the air. That's fine in a tall (vaulted ceiling) room where you want to get heat down from the peak. But if you want to get heat in other rooms, you want to create a air circuit. I.e. stratified air flows. The best way to do that is to *slowly* blow the coldest air towards the stove. I.e. have a fan on the floor, running slow. It'll be replaced by air that flows the opposite way along the ceiling. That is the warm air. For moving heat to another floor I do this: I move heat from the basement where the stove is to the rest of the house above it by having one register in the living room, a metal duct between the joists to a side wall of the basement, an elbow, a fire damper, and then flexible duct down to an inline fan mounted on the concrete slab (less vibration in the joists and studs). This fan *sucks*.the coldest air from my living room floor and deposits it on the basement floor That pushes the hottest air along the basement ceiling up the stairs to my living spaces.
If you are trying to move heat to another part of the house (let's say to the other end, bedrooms maybe) put a fan on the floor at the furtherest point away, pointing back toward the stove, running on low...the cold air pushed out (cold air is denser, easier to move) will be replaced by warm air. If your house lends itself to doing this with a short duct/fan then even better...but at the same time many have tried just leaving the furnace blower run constant to move the heat, unfortunately it doesn't seem to work very well for most...the heat just seems to be lost in the (often not well insulated) ductwork. We have a center stairwell cape cod and a fan running on the opposite side of the house circulates the heat pretty well, as long as all the doors remain open.
