New Hampton Insert - Problems Distributing Heat

[teamcurrent]

Folks, I'm at wits end and I'm grasping for straws. So that's what is driving me to post a message seeking help.

I live in a single floor ranch - say a little less than 2000 sq ft. Just had a Hampton HI300 installed. I have it fired up real good. Hot as the blazes. The blower is working perfectly also. The problem is that I'm only getting heat for about 10 feet. If I walk more than 10 feet away from the stove, the house is freezing. I've had the thing burning hot for 2 days straight, with the damper wide open the whole time - eating wood very fast. And still I cannot get the rest of the house to heat up. I tried putting a pedestal fan 5 feet away from the stove, trying to blow heat to the far side of the house, to no avail. The pedestal fan just turns the hot air cold and circulates cold air. I don't know what to do. I was hoping I wouldn't have to use my furnace much any more since I have 2 cords of wood ready to burn, but I'm getting nowhere. House is still freezing. I feel like I just wasted ALOT of money on this thing.

Is there anything I can do short of cutting holes through walls to install puller fans for the adjacent rooms?

Any help is appreciated. It especially sucks this week because it's 19 degrees here - pretty much the coldest it ever gets.

Thanks.

 

[jotulguy]

Folks, I'm at wits end and I'm grasping for straws. So that's what is driving me to post a message seeking help.

I live in a single floor ranch - say a little less than 2000 sq ft. Just had a Hampton HI300 installed. I have it fired up real good. Hot as the blazes. The blower is working perfectly also. The problem is that I'm only getting heat for about 10 feet. If I walk more than 10 feet away from the stove, the house is freezing. I've had the thing burning hot for 2 days straight, with the damper wide open the whole time - eating wood very fast. And still I cannot get the rest of the house to heat up. I tried putting a pedestal fan 5 feet away from the stove, trying to blow heat to the far side of the house, to no avail. The pedestal fan just turns the hot air cold and circulates cold air. I don't know what to do. I was hoping I wouldn't have to use my furnace much any more since I have 2 cords of wood ready to burn, but I'm getting nowhere. House is still freezing. I feel like I just wasted ALOT of money on this thing.

Is there anything I can do short of cutting holes through walls to install puller fans for the adjacent rooms?

Any help is appreciated. It especially sucks this week because it's 19 degrees here - pretty much the coldest it ever gets.

Thanks.

The first thing i would recommend is not running the unit with the air wide open. Think of your air control as a damper also. If it is wide open it is letting most of the heat up the flue. Once you get a good coal bed going turn it down to half or a little more. By doing this you will slow down the flow up your flue. In turn giving you more heat!

Also, many folks on here have had great luck with a fan pointing at the stove. That will bring in the cooler air from other parts of the home and create a convective loop of heat transfer.

 

[FPX Dude]

Hello fellow BGE'r...so how is the room/house insulated? Someone here said it's like trying to fill a 5-gal bucket with hose if there's a 3 inch hole in it, it not properly insulated. Get in IR gun, zap the windows, doors, floors, ceilings, anything, just to find out where the temp changes occur. I found a front entry door that would literally "blowout" a candle if I held it to the door seal. I have two story but one-story should be easier. Also, I found upstairs gas fake fireplace in the master that uh had a 6" flue. That was sucking air outta the house, so basically the air had to be entering from somewhere giving me a horrible negative-pressure situation. If that all checks out ok, then what's yer floor plan?

 

[Rudyjr]

Folks, I'm at wits end and I'm grasping for straws. So that's what is driving me to post a message seeking help.

I live in a single floor ranch - say a little less than 2000 sq ft. Just had a Hampton HI300 installed. I have it fired up real good. Hot as the blazes. The blower is working perfectly also. The problem is that I'm only getting heat for about 10 feet. If I walk more than 10 feet away from the stove, the house is freezing. I've had the thing burning hot for 2 days straight, with the damper wide open the whole time - eating wood very fast. And still I cannot get the rest of the house to heat up. I tried putting a pedestal fan 5 feet away from the stove, trying to blow heat to the far side of the house, to no avail. The pedestal fan just turns the hot air cold and circulates cold air. I don't know what to do. I was hoping I wouldn't have to use my furnace much any more since I have 2 cords of wood ready to burn, but I'm getting nowhere. House is still freezing. I feel like I just wasted ALOT of money on this thing.

Is there anything I can do short of cutting holes through walls to install puller fans for the adjacent rooms?

Any help is appreciated. It especially sucks this week because it's 19 degrees here - pretty much the coldest it ever gets.

Thanks.

Can you tell everyone specifics of the installation and chimney? Interior or exterior chimney, insulated or uninsulated liner, capped at the top and a block off plate installed in the damper area? There are quite a few instances on this forum of inserts installed over the years without block off plates and poorly sealed caps that will not heat properly because the heat is going up the chimney.

 

[teamcurrent]

jotulguy - Very good point. I don't know why I didn't think of that with the damper. But when I bring the air flow down, even a little bit, I start losing the fire very quickly. Maybe I'm using logs that are too big? I like the idea of the fan pointing at the stove. I'll try that.

FPX Dude - I don't have any direct air leaks, but the far end of the house sits over a 2 car garage. The ceiling of the garage is insulated from the prior owner, but it still makes the rooms a little colder than the rest of the house. Tough to deal with. Floor plan is a basic ranch (long and skinny) with the stove on one end of the house, making it very difficult for me to get heat to that other end.

Rudyjr - It was installed by a really good local company and I checked out everything myself afterwards, so the work is done right. It's an existing exterior masonry chimney with both the heating flue and fireplace flu. Heating flue is 8"x8" terracotta, fireplace flue is 8"x13". Both newly relined with Forever Flex 316Ti stainless. Damper area is insulated and blocked off. You mentioned poorly sealed caps....do you mean the flue connector bracket?

I'm gonna fire it up again when I get home from work and play around more with the airflow and pedestal fan. Will report tomorrow.

Thanks all!

 

[MetMan]

If your fire is dying when you turn the air down it's probably unseasoned wood. Try some bundles of wood from the quicky mart and see if you find a difference. I also second the suggestion of a box fan pushing cold air toward the room with the fireplace--it makes a huge difference. If you are using large logs that are not optimally seasoned, you should split them smaller for better results. Good luck!

 

[stejus]

If you shut the air down, even a little bit, and you loose the fire, sounds like wood is the problem. If the wood is seasoned properly, within five minutes on a good coal bed, you should see charring on the wood edges. At this point if you knock it down 1" it should continue to burn, not show signs of going out. If it doesn' continue to burn, your wood is not seasoned. Another way to tell is look at your chimney. If you are still smoking like a smoke dragon after 5 minutes, your wood is wet (green).

Another problem may be draft. Is your liner insulated? A cold stack will result in a poor draft.

 

[teamcurrent]

OK I figured it out. Half the wood is still green. Lovely. But the biggest fix was changing the direction of the fan. That got the whole house to heat up in 20 minutes.

Now I have to find dry would somewhere and leave my pile for next year. Something tells me I'm gonna wind up spending alot.

Thanks for the help folks. Happy Holidays.

 

[Rudyjr]

OK I figured it out. Half the wood is still green. Lovely. But the biggest fix was changing the direction of the fan. That got the whole house to heat up in 20 minutes.

Now I have to find dry would somewhere and leave my pile for next year. Something tells me I'm gonna wind up spending alot.

Thanks for the help folks. Happy Holidays.

Glad you figured out the problem. Was the fan in the insert actually going the wrong way or installed backward? Just curious. Jim

 

[teamcurrent]

No, I meant the pedestal fan needed the direction changed. The blower was installed correctly from the start.

 

[begreen]

How did you make out with the wood search? Were you able to find some good dry wood before the snows fell?

 

[burntime]

My 1957 brick ranch in Wi. is completely heated with same unit. I have done it well into negative territory. I know some see way colder then that but when its 15 below and the house is at 75 its a nice feeling!

 

[teamcurrent]

Still can't find dry wood. It's impossible this season, evidently. I'm burning green stuff for lack of anything adequate.

I'm THIS close to burning my dining room furniture at this rate! (picture me with thumb and pointer finger about a half inch apart from each other)

I was able to get my hands on 3 cords worth of green stuff though. So this debacle will NEVER happen again. I'll always have seasoned wood from here on out.

 

[MetMan]

Have you looked for Eco Bricks/Bio Bricks/Pressed Sawdust bricks? Might be a good option for you for the rest of this season vs. green wood. A 4x4x3 pallet is $300 delivered here and they say it's a cord equivalent of BTUs or thereabouts.