OlFezziwig t1_j6p6gd2 wrote on January 31, 2023 at 10:28 PM

Regarding using your wood stove. I’m not sure what your setup is, but I have seen instances where a wood stove heats a portion of your house smaller than your furnace does. This may be fine most of the time but during an extreme cold event your pipes could freeze because the wood stove isn’t heating the whole house. Again, this may not be an issue for you but something to consider.

MysteryOil OP t1_j6p87gk wrote on January 31, 2023 at 10:39 PM

Thank you. I've been battling with the wood stove all winter. It's in the basement, and the previous owners drywalled the ceiling. So that, in addition to it being (it turns out) a very tightly sealed log cabin, has been a huge headache. 100 degrees in the basement. 60 degrees in the room above it, with a register in the floor directly above the wood stove and the basement door open and 2 other registers in the room expected to work as return registers (spoiler: they don't). I've recently resorted to (at my neighbor's suggestion) cracking a window in the basement, and one on the top floor, and sucking the air through. This has worked for the last week. Not sure how this will play out in the coming days, but gaining various measures of optimism from other points brought up in this thread. Thank you again.

_tjb t1_j6pbk3e wrote on January 31, 2023 at 11:01 PM

Something to encourage you:

My house was built in 1790, post and beam, renovated in the 80s, but still not super modern. We have a wood stove in the living room, and a couple of fans to move warmer air to the bedrooms. Works fantastic all winter - all the heat we want and it’s free.

The cellar walls are stone (fitted loosely together - no mortar or anything. Like I said, 1790), and the floor is dirt. Anyway, heating with only wood for the past ten years. In all that time, I have never, not once, seen the cellar go below 45 degrees. I have a remote thermometer down there that sends its data to a station in the living room. Temp outside could be -5. The cellar is 45, and the living room is 80. It’s fantastic.

Difficult-Building32 t1_j6pbohb wrote on January 31, 2023 at 11:02 PM

Welcome to NH, please behave. I had this issue when I first moved into my house. Floor registers don't work well. I put a draft inducer on one register and it worked a little better.

What helped the most, was to put a second stove in the room I spent most of the time in... Now we just fire up the stove in the basement in times like this coming weekend.