2 Inserts in a house?

[Kat1285]

We have purchased a FireplaceX large flush hybrid-fyre insert for our walkout basement. It is not installed yet. We currently have a Vermont Castings Montpelier insert installed on our first floor. Layout is open floor plan on main floor with a large sunroom with 15 windows, kitchen has one wall of floor the ceiling windows, lots of windows in this house. To be exact we have 44 windows. The Montpelier supplements our geothermal unit. Our geothermal unit lines run into a lake so it's not the most efficient in the winter. The geothermal unit by itself cannot heat past 63-65 when temps drop below 32. We have spray foamed all the ceilings but not the walls. The walls still have the original bat insulation from 1966. The house is approximately 3500sqft with the main floor being about 400sqft larger than the basement. The Montpelier cannot be used solely to heat the house. It merely supplements the home. With the geo running and thermostat set to 68 and the Montpelier running hot we stay at 68. If chit the geo off the temps start dropping inside the house by using the Montpelier only. We have 3 year old dry seasoned wood. Tested with a moisture meter. I believe the Montpelier is running at optimal efficiency but it's just not made to heat the space we need it to heat?

We have the opportunity to buy another FireplaceX large flush nex-gen hybrid insert for a great price. The questions are....are we going to run ourselves out of the house if we have both large flush inserts going. Would it be better to move the Montpelier to the basement and install the large flush we already have on the main floor, or would we really benefit from having two large flush inserts in our home. We would like to be able to hear our home primarily with these inserts and rely less on the geothermal unit in the winter to save costs because our electricity is expensive and we have a lot of power outages. We live in the woods so being able to keep a good stock of wood is not a factor in the price.

Thank you in advance for your help and input.

 

[NickW]

That's a lot of square footage. I doubt you'll overheat the house if you only use both when needed. Depending on the space, a stove in the basement would supply more heat than a flush insert. Might get by in shoulder season just running in the basement if you can get the heat to move upstairs.

 

[Kat1285]

That's a lot of square footage. I doubt you'll overheat the house if you only use both when needed. Depending on the space, a stove in the basement would supply more heat than a flush insert. Might get by in shoulder season just running in the basement if you can get the heat to move upstairs.

Thank you for the reply

 

[Ctwoodtick]

I imagine Indiana gets chilly. With the larger house, I think 2 insert would be just fine.

 

[EbS-P]

We finished our walk out basement and added an insert in the downstairs fireplace. Our upstairs stove is undersized.

I’ll give you my thoughts. If you even run both and start both within the same hour you will never have made more trips up and down the stairs. I have a wireless Auber AT200 so I can monitor downstairs temps from upstairs.

Two is a lot of work. I only light both if it’s really cold and I know I won’t be using the heatpump for a couple days straight. Or we are hanging out in the basement.

Yes you probably can overheat the place but you will lean how much heat you need and light and load accordingly.

Having two in the same model is nice. Kinda wish I had that but the downstairs stove won’t burn the same as the upstairs because the flue is taller. In fact in need a damper to run my downstairs insert controllably.

Id do it?

 

[stoveliker]

I would not. The amount of work it is to get your wood split and stacked is too large. The size of woodshed you need to be 3 years ahead is drool worthy though.

If you do, do get a splitter, tractor and log deliveries....

 

[Ctwoodtick]

That’s is true. 2 stoves would be a to. Of work