Wood Stove - Heat output in fireplace fire box versus out front on hearth

[hydestone]

I have a fireplace in my basement that I've used infrequently over the years, a couple times a month at most. When the Covid situation happened, I started working out of the basement instead of driving in to the office. The room I work in is 12x26 and 1/2 underground, so it stays approximately 62 degrees year round. When I light the fireplace, I get it up into the low 70s, but obviously burn through a ton of wood and overall I lose heat and $$ up the flue.

I dropped in a new liner and installed a stove within the firebox. The face of the stove is flush with the face of the masonry opening. Basically a straight shot right down into the top of the stove. The damper is properly sealed off and so is the plate at the top of the liner, so there is no air escaping up the flue. The room gets warm, but not as much as I would have expected.

I've been using an old fan to circulate the air in the room which works pretty well...room gets up into the high 70s.

I am wondering if I should pull the stove out and install a tee connection instead. That way I can eliminate the fan and get more heat in the room. There are no clearance issues, just takes up more space in the room for the rest of the year when I won't be burning wood for heat.

My questions is...will the stove heat much better if out in the room versus in the firebox?

 

[EatenByLimestone]

Did you install a stove, or an insert? Are the walls of your basement insulated? Tell me about the wood you're burning and how you're operating the stove?

 

[hydestone]

Stove. The walls are partially insulated...on the exterior. 12 x 26 room with 3 foundation walls, the fourth wall is interior - the rest of the basement. (1) 12' wall and the 26' wall have 2" rigid. The other 12' wall is uninsulated. Woo. Wood is 2 year seasoned red oak. Standard burning.

I heat my upstairs with a wood stove. Different type of stove, same wood. The upstairs is very well insulated, so no issues heating up there.

 

[hydestone]

I think the answer is to move the stove out of the firebox to get the natural convection, instead of using the fan. Instead of the electric fan, I could use an eco fan.

The fan I've been using is a 1917 Westinghouse that I saved from a dumpster and restored last spring...kind of like getting some use out of it - whisper quiet with almost no electrical draw!

 

[EatenByLimestone]

I like how the old fans have lube points. I run a couple old fans too!

You may want to insulate the walls on the interior. Concrete can suck heat up.

 

[moresnow]

What model stove?

 

[hydestone]

I've got a lot of built in millwork on the exterior walls, so I am reluctant to demo it just to add the insulation, although I agree that would be a big improvement. It would probably be cheaper to excavate down on the exterior of the foundation and put in a few layers of rigid board insulation. Would also be less likely to have condensation / mold issues if the insulation was outboard. Maybe in 15 years after I put the kids through college ;-)

This is my first "old school" fan. I hooked up a kill-a-wall device to measure the kwh and surprisingly it only costs a little over $0.05 to run it for 8 hours...much less than a new plastic fan that doesn't move nearly as much air. Just can't put your fingers near it while it is running!

 

[EatenByLimestone]

Yeah, the old fans lacked a bit of a guard on the blades.

 

[Das Jugghead]

I have a fireplace in my basement that I've used infrequently over the years, a couple times a month at most. When the Covid situation happened, I started working out of the basement instead of driving in to the office. The room I work in is 12x26 and 1/2 underground, so it stays approximately 62 degrees year round. When I light the fireplace, I get it up into the low 70s, but obviously burn through a ton of wood and overall I lose heat and $$ up the flue.

I dropped in a new liner and installed a stove within the firebox. The face of the stove is flush with the face of the masonry opening. Basically a straight shot right down into the top of the stove. The damper is properly sealed off and so is the plate at the top of the liner, so there is no air escaping up the flue. The room gets warm, but not as much as I would have expected.

I've been using an old fan to circulate the air in the room which works pretty well...room gets up into the high 70s.

I am wondering if I should pull the stove out and install a tee connection instead. That way I can eliminate the fan and get more heat in the room. There are no clearance issues, just takes up more space in the room for the rest of the year when I won't be burning wood for heat.

My questions is...will the stove heat much better if out in the room versus in the firebox?

If you insulate the firebox of the fireplace and then cover that insulation with aluminum that will help reflect heat out of the fireplace. I have a similar set up in our living room and once I insulated and covered with aluminum it made a very noticeable difference in heat output - still nowhere near to what we would have if we were able to have to stove on the heart in front of the fireplace rather than inside the firebox of the fireplace. Unfortunately extending the heath would eat up too much real-estate in our living room.

The first pictures shows the aluminum sheeting. I picked up a roll at the local Menards. Behind the aluminum is rock wool. I finished it off with some sheet metal I bent into form to clean up the appearance.

 

[jetsam]

The best thing for heat output would be to move it out of the fireplace.... but now you have to extend the hearth and drill a new hole higher in the chimney for the flue pipe, unless it's a rear-vent stove. Check your stove's manual to see what the minimum rise before an elbow is to get a feel for what this would look like.

Insulating the fireplace is a whole lot easier, and should help a lot. I'd probably look into putting Micore on the floor and Roxul plus something else on the other 4 sides- something else being cement board/micore, or sheet metal.

One more consideration is how the stove drafts now. If draft is strong, either plan is probably okay. If draft is weak, moving it out of the fireplace looks less attractive because you are adding two 90s and will now need to add height to the stack too.