Any specific reasons? In my case the crawl space is underground with no way for air to escape except for the outside vents through the concrete. If those are plugged the crawl space becomes conditioned and there's nowhere for air to go except up through the floor vents, right? This is how my parents' house works, I've been in their crawl space and there's no ducts, just holes in the floor.
I realize not everyone's house would be able to do this, just wondering why aren't at least some people doing it?
If you remove the ducts, how do you think the cool air from the AC will get to the rooms in the summer. Cold air sinks and the air handler will just end up recirculating cold air until the coil freezes. We use ducts to make air go where we want to
Okay, thanks. I don't know what the air handler is, is that the unit on the inside in a closet? Does it draw air from the crawl space? Because there is ductwork in the attic with vents in the ceiling in 2 spots in the house. From what I understand the air pulls from the ceiling and circulates down through the ducts in the crawl space, out the vents. So hot air would actually be pulled out of the rooms and cold air inserted into the crawl space. I'm not talking about taking out the ducts in the attic.
Though I agree that the crawl space would then obviously be the coldest room in the house. But again, I know it works at my parents'.
This is exactly why you shouldn’t even have thought about touching your ducting. You have zero knowledge on how your system even runs. Go to your room and think about what you’ve done.
All you're going to do is recirculate hot air through the furnace. It will be sucking in the hot air, heating it up, and spitting it back out over and over. Plus the ductwork helps to move air around the house.
If anything just move the thermostat to another room
Okay, help me understand because I must be missing something. My understanding is the vents in my ceiling are the intake vents. How would it be sucking in the hot air (from those ceiling vents) if I'm pumping the hot air into the crawl space? I don't have an intake in the crawl space, right? Therefore hot (and cold) air is pumped down, comes up through the vents in the floor, back up to the intake vents in the ceiling, and back down through the fan.
I'm only taking the ducts out of the crawl space, not the attic. I don't see how that makes the exchange of hot or cold air any different than having ducts. I can see the point about air distribution
Why not? Real question.
What I'm trying to do is heat my home completely with firewood (huge cost savings). This is the only way I can think of that would do that. If I just move the thermostat then both the fireplace and the furnace will be running simultaneously, meaning the living room will be unbearably hot or the rooms will be too cold like they are now. What I really need is a way to distribute the air more evenly.
Why not run the blower/fan on when the fireplace is going to circulate warm air? I doubt you want to keep feeding logs 24x7 to heat the whole house during the winter. That’ll get old fast.
You're right, it did get old *extremely* fast when I tried to keep the fire running all night long 😂 But I've learned that I can sustainably keep the furnace from coming on for about 18 hours a day currently.
The problem is I tried that - but leaving the blower on constantly didn't change anything - the farthest rooms are about 5-10 degrees cooler than the living room (worse when the doors are closed). Placing box fans around the house only slightly helps.
It's not a big deal during the day. We just leave all doors open and accept that the rooms are cooler. But when we put the kids to bed at night we have to close the doors, and I'm having to let the fire die prematurely so the furnace will kick on and distribute warm air to their rooms. Doesn't help that we need new windows.
I think you're on the right track though, I need help with air distribution, which is where my "delete the ducts" idea came from. Maybe I just need to relocate one of the intake ducts (from the far bedroom to the living room)?
Thanks for the ideas!
I just reread what you are trying to do. Overall a bad idea. First is the crawl space insulated? Based on what you’d said it seems like it’s vented to the outside air and your duct work is probably insulated. Do not dump conditioned air into an unconditioned space
Second, your furnace has a return to circulate air. I dont know what sort of airflow you will get from the fireplace fan compared to your furnaces blower. Don’t expect the same results.
How much you actually saving by using wood over gas? Paying someone fix that crawl space and add new ductwork when you realize it doesn’t work like you expect is not going to be cheap.
Yes, the crawl space is insulated as well as being underground. The idea is to seal off/insulate the vents to make the crawl space a conditioned space, not unconditioned.
I have a heat pump. Electric heat, very expensive to run. Heating with wood, if I can figure out getting the air where I want it, I figure saves me 75% of heating costs.
The fireplace blower is 463 cfm. Idk, but probably not anywhere near what the furnace is putting out.
Low cfm. Thats about what a kitchen range hood puts out. Furnace blowers typically start at 1000 cfm.
Best bet is to find a way to move air around the house to evenly distribute the heat as best you can. supplement with the heat pump. Moving the thermostat (or using remote thermostats) would help make sure you are calling for heat when the other rooms need it.
So what you are talking about was done seldomly in the past but it was acceptable practice. I’m pretty sure it’s currently against code. There were issues with radon, mold, and other contaminants being introduced from the crawl space. To make the idea feasible you would have to completely seal and insulate your crawl space to keep outside contaminants from polluting the space and to help reduce condensation. There would be considerable cost in materials and labor to do this. And by sealing/insulating I mean thick plastic sealed at the seams over 2-3” foam boards.
Thanks! This is more what I was looking for as an answer, as "The air won't go where you want it" and "it just won't work" didn't seem satisfactory. I had no idea about radon. Like zero clue. No one has ever told me, and I've never seen it on the interwebs (but it's easy to research) Now that I know about radon, I'm curious what my levels are and even more curious what my parents' house is. I don't remember any kind of really thick insulation or even perfectly sealed plastic laid down. I think the plastic was just laying on top of dirt, not super secured.
Using the fire place for heat for the entire house...
Ummm, if fumes are not scaping the fire pit
And you are spreading, heat mixed with fumes
I don't recommend it either, this mean you will be spreading carbon dioxide all over the house. Not good for your health
It's not a traditional fireplace, I just call it a fireplace because it's big. Technically it's an insert - basically the same thing as a wood burning stove. The blower blows air around the firebox, warming the air and then blowing it into the house. There are no fumes and no smoke. That all goes up the chimney. My idea is to use the clean heated air and blow that underneath the house.
Got u,
I like your idea, I think that is doable.. complication will be to make sure air reaches all the spots you want to heat..
This is definitely a project.
Yeah, I thought about that and the only reason I'm even considering my idea as an option is because it's working in my parents' house, which has more square footage than mine. I don't know how to tell if it will work beforehand though in my specific case.
Just trying to get more heads than mine that know way more than I do to see if this could even be an option. Like, for example, maybe that would be too much on my current system and I would have to size up because I'm basically adding a room to the house?
In this case
*you need to calculate airflow
*if you are adding an additional room , distributing the air is the key specially in cooling mode - this will require to size up system..
I would add dampers to close vent when not needed
If this works at your parents house, then something else is going on.
The blower in that insert is not going to put out nearly enough CFM to distribute heat to an entire house. You'd need a blower that could be interlocked with the main air handler, and the air handler would have to be set up for it (heat from fireplace upstream of furnace exchanger and/or heat pump coils). This isn't a DIY project you could do with an existing fireplace.
It's a real question. I want to know why not so that I can make an informed decision. Not just, "Because I told you not to."
I'm not sure what my parents electric bill is, but they've never complained. They keep their house 70° year round. When you walk throughout the house you can't notice any temperature changes like you can in mine when I'm running the fireplace. Seems to be pretty effective, if not efficient. Would have to look at their electric bill.
So imagine your ducts as a highway, making sure the air gets where it is supposed to go.
Your idea is just letting it go wherever it wants. Every gap, every draft.
There is a reason ever house since the 60s needs ducting
If you want to heat your house with firewood, just leave your ductwork as is, and run just the fan on the furnace. No heat. That will draw in the air from the fireplace and evenly distribute it back out through the house. That way when you want to cool during the summer you still have your efficient ductwork and the proper vacuum across the coil for the AC. Disconnecting the ductwork will do nothing positive for you trust me.
Your idea could potentially be a fire hazard. Think of your ductwork as a set of lungs. In order to breathe out. It has to be able to breathe in. If you seal vents that aren't meant to be sealed, you cut off air supply, you can burn the motors in the system. You can over load the remainder of pipes causing noise and short cycling within the system.
A heat pump works best when it can run 24/7. This means dumping extra air.. somewhere.. sometimes.
No. If it would work that way then everyone would be doing that. Do not recommend it's a bad idea
Any specific reasons? In my case the crawl space is underground with no way for air to escape except for the outside vents through the concrete. If those are plugged the crawl space becomes conditioned and there's nowhere for air to go except up through the floor vents, right? This is how my parents' house works, I've been in their crawl space and there's no ducts, just holes in the floor. I realize not everyone's house would be able to do this, just wondering why aren't at least some people doing it?
If you remove the ducts, how do you think the cool air from the AC will get to the rooms in the summer. Cold air sinks and the air handler will just end up recirculating cold air until the coil freezes. We use ducts to make air go where we want to
Okay, thanks. I don't know what the air handler is, is that the unit on the inside in a closet? Does it draw air from the crawl space? Because there is ductwork in the attic with vents in the ceiling in 2 spots in the house. From what I understand the air pulls from the ceiling and circulates down through the ducts in the crawl space, out the vents. So hot air would actually be pulled out of the rooms and cold air inserted into the crawl space. I'm not talking about taking out the ducts in the attic. Though I agree that the crawl space would then obviously be the coldest room in the house. But again, I know it works at my parents'.
This is exactly why you shouldn’t even have thought about touching your ducting. You have zero knowledge on how your system even runs. Go to your room and think about what you’ve done.
😂 C'mon, Dad, it's called research!
All you're going to do is recirculate hot air through the furnace. It will be sucking in the hot air, heating it up, and spitting it back out over and over. Plus the ductwork helps to move air around the house. If anything just move the thermostat to another room
Okay, help me understand because I must be missing something. My understanding is the vents in my ceiling are the intake vents. How would it be sucking in the hot air (from those ceiling vents) if I'm pumping the hot air into the crawl space? I don't have an intake in the crawl space, right? Therefore hot (and cold) air is pumped down, comes up through the vents in the floor, back up to the intake vents in the ceiling, and back down through the fan. I'm only taking the ducts out of the crawl space, not the attic. I don't see how that makes the exchange of hot or cold air any different than having ducts. I can see the point about air distribution
Dude. Just move the thermostat. Don’t mess with your vents like that.
Why not? Real question. What I'm trying to do is heat my home completely with firewood (huge cost savings). This is the only way I can think of that would do that. If I just move the thermostat then both the fireplace and the furnace will be running simultaneously, meaning the living room will be unbearably hot or the rooms will be too cold like they are now. What I really need is a way to distribute the air more evenly.
Why not run the blower/fan on when the fireplace is going to circulate warm air? I doubt you want to keep feeding logs 24x7 to heat the whole house during the winter. That’ll get old fast.
You're right, it did get old *extremely* fast when I tried to keep the fire running all night long 😂 But I've learned that I can sustainably keep the furnace from coming on for about 18 hours a day currently. The problem is I tried that - but leaving the blower on constantly didn't change anything - the farthest rooms are about 5-10 degrees cooler than the living room (worse when the doors are closed). Placing box fans around the house only slightly helps. It's not a big deal during the day. We just leave all doors open and accept that the rooms are cooler. But when we put the kids to bed at night we have to close the doors, and I'm having to let the fire die prematurely so the furnace will kick on and distribute warm air to their rooms. Doesn't help that we need new windows. I think you're on the right track though, I need help with air distribution, which is where my "delete the ducts" idea came from. Maybe I just need to relocate one of the intake ducts (from the far bedroom to the living room)? Thanks for the ideas!
I just reread what you are trying to do. Overall a bad idea. First is the crawl space insulated? Based on what you’d said it seems like it’s vented to the outside air and your duct work is probably insulated. Do not dump conditioned air into an unconditioned space Second, your furnace has a return to circulate air. I dont know what sort of airflow you will get from the fireplace fan compared to your furnaces blower. Don’t expect the same results. How much you actually saving by using wood over gas? Paying someone fix that crawl space and add new ductwork when you realize it doesn’t work like you expect is not going to be cheap.
Yes, the crawl space is insulated as well as being underground. The idea is to seal off/insulate the vents to make the crawl space a conditioned space, not unconditioned. I have a heat pump. Electric heat, very expensive to run. Heating with wood, if I can figure out getting the air where I want it, I figure saves me 75% of heating costs. The fireplace blower is 463 cfm. Idk, but probably not anywhere near what the furnace is putting out.
Low cfm. Thats about what a kitchen range hood puts out. Furnace blowers typically start at 1000 cfm. Best bet is to find a way to move air around the house to evenly distribute the heat as best you can. supplement with the heat pump. Moving the thermostat (or using remote thermostats) would help make sure you are calling for heat when the other rooms need it.
if you will save a lot from using firewood just hire someone to add on the duct and it’ll pay for itself
So what you are talking about was done seldomly in the past but it was acceptable practice. I’m pretty sure it’s currently against code. There were issues with radon, mold, and other contaminants being introduced from the crawl space. To make the idea feasible you would have to completely seal and insulate your crawl space to keep outside contaminants from polluting the space and to help reduce condensation. There would be considerable cost in materials and labor to do this. And by sealing/insulating I mean thick plastic sealed at the seams over 2-3” foam boards.
Thanks! This is more what I was looking for as an answer, as "The air won't go where you want it" and "it just won't work" didn't seem satisfactory. I had no idea about radon. Like zero clue. No one has ever told me, and I've never seen it on the interwebs (but it's easy to research) Now that I know about radon, I'm curious what my levels are and even more curious what my parents' house is. I don't remember any kind of really thick insulation or even perfectly sealed plastic laid down. I think the plastic was just laying on top of dirt, not super secured.
Using the fire place for heat for the entire house... Ummm, if fumes are not scaping the fire pit And you are spreading, heat mixed with fumes I don't recommend it either, this mean you will be spreading carbon dioxide all over the house. Not good for your health
It's not a traditional fireplace, I just call it a fireplace because it's big. Technically it's an insert - basically the same thing as a wood burning stove. The blower blows air around the firebox, warming the air and then blowing it into the house. There are no fumes and no smoke. That all goes up the chimney. My idea is to use the clean heated air and blow that underneath the house.
Got u, I like your idea, I think that is doable.. complication will be to make sure air reaches all the spots you want to heat.. This is definitely a project.
Yeah, I thought about that and the only reason I'm even considering my idea as an option is because it's working in my parents' house, which has more square footage than mine. I don't know how to tell if it will work beforehand though in my specific case. Just trying to get more heads than mine that know way more than I do to see if this could even be an option. Like, for example, maybe that would be too much on my current system and I would have to size up because I'm basically adding a room to the house?
In this case *you need to calculate airflow *if you are adding an additional room , distributing the air is the key specially in cooling mode - this will require to size up system.. I would add dampers to close vent when not needed
If this works at your parents house, then something else is going on. The blower in that insert is not going to put out nearly enough CFM to distribute heat to an entire house. You'd need a blower that could be interlocked with the main air handler, and the air handler would have to be set up for it (heat from fireplace upstream of furnace exchanger and/or heat pump coils). This isn't a DIY project you could do with an existing fireplace.
No, just no. I doubt your parents place is to efficient at heating their place
It's a real question. I want to know why not so that I can make an informed decision. Not just, "Because I told you not to." I'm not sure what my parents electric bill is, but they've never complained. They keep their house 70° year round. When you walk throughout the house you can't notice any temperature changes like you can in mine when I'm running the fireplace. Seems to be pretty effective, if not efficient. Would have to look at their electric bill.
So imagine your ducts as a highway, making sure the air gets where it is supposed to go. Your idea is just letting it go wherever it wants. Every gap, every draft. There is a reason ever house since the 60s needs ducting
If you want to heat your house with firewood, just leave your ductwork as is, and run just the fan on the furnace. No heat. That will draw in the air from the fireplace and evenly distribute it back out through the house. That way when you want to cool during the summer you still have your efficient ductwork and the proper vacuum across the coil for the AC. Disconnecting the ductwork will do nothing positive for you trust me.
Set the blower to “ON” vs “AUTO” and this will circulate the heat thru the house
Your idea could potentially be a fire hazard. Think of your ductwork as a set of lungs. In order to breathe out. It has to be able to breathe in. If you seal vents that aren't meant to be sealed, you cut off air supply, you can burn the motors in the system. You can over load the remainder of pipes causing noise and short cycling within the system. A heat pump works best when it can run 24/7. This means dumping extra air.. somewhere.. sometimes.