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Small Cabin Forum / Off-Grid Living / A Tip that may be helpful w/ winter coming

Author	Message
trollbridge Member	# Posted: 11 Oct 2011 10:35am Reply  Thought I would pass this info along, it may help some of you having trouble getting your cabins warmed up with your wood stoves. We had some trouble too at first until we finally installed two ceiling fans up at the peak of the ceiling. We put one over the loft and one over the area that is open to below. Make sense? I'll try to find a pic. Anyways what we found was that it makes a HUGE difference for a very small amount of power-we can run both of these off our one (not very good) battery for the entire night. The one over the sleeping areas in the loft keeps you from getting baked and the one over the open area blows all that hot air down to the main cabin. It takes waaay less time now to heat the cabin up when we arrive on a freezing Friday night!! Hope someone finds this as useful as we did. Here's pics. fan over main section of loft fan over open section to below
bobrok Member	# Posted: 11 Oct 2011 03:49pm Reply  Quoting: trollbridge we can run both of these off our one (not very good) battery for the entire night trollbridge, Are these DC powered fans or are you running an AC inverter? bob
trollbridge Member	# Posted: 11 Oct 2011 04:20pm Reply  We can run them either way but at night we run them through an inverter.
MtnDon Member	# Posted: 11 Oct 2011 05:32pm Reply  We use an RCH 24 volt DC deiling fan. Great fans especially with the cyclone blades.
brandywine Member	# Posted: 11 Oct 2011 08:33pm Reply  You cannot heat with wood or gas space heaters without getting the heat off the ceiling. CRITICAL! Check out Monte Carlo fans with DC motors. They absolutely sip power. I bought an Avanti which has the lowest energy use of all fans. Go to Energy Star website to get the list. Hunter is the worst. Even a floor fan pointed up does wonders.
brandywine Member	# Posted: 11 Oct 2011 08:42pm Reply  http://www.energystar.gov/index.cfm?fuseaction=find_a_product.showProductGroup&pgw_co de=CF Here is the energy star list page
Montanan Member	# Posted: 12 Oct 2011 01:02pm Reply  Thanks for the info. We are planning a ceiling fan at the peak of the roof over the half loft region. Do you think we'd also need one over the back part of the loft? I can't tell from your photos how far apart your 2 fans are. Our loft space is about 20' (front 10' is half- with the rest open to below- where the stove is located and the back 10' is full loft, covering the whole lower level.) Thanks!
trollbridge Member	# Posted: 12 Oct 2011 01:30pm - Edited by: trollbridge Reply  Hi! So your loft is L shaped like ours is. Our cabin is 26' long and both of our fans are mounted on our ridge beam and I'm guessing maybe about 12' apart or so. One is over the "full" loft section and the other is over the "half" loft so that fan circulates the air over that space but mainly blows all the hot air produced by the stove back downstairs(or keeps more of it there in the first place). If one fan is great then two are that much better right?!? Besides you have electricity so why not,plus you won't have to run both if you don't need to. Did it get hot in your loft this summer? Our fans are just as valuable to us during the warm months as the cold. Overall,they have been one of the most useful,convenient and cost effective purchases we have made for the cabin!
Montanan Member	# Posted: 12 Oct 2011 01:37pm Reply  Oops- that was incorrect- ours is also 26' feet long. ;P It sounds like it might make sense to put up 2. We can use ones with lights and take care of our lighting at the same time. Thanks! Yes, it got hot up there in the summer. We have great big windows in the front and the rear and got a nice cross breeze but a fan would be great at night. And yes- L shaped loft too! (I call it a 3/4 loft.)
trollbridge Member	# Posted: 12 Oct 2011 01:44pm Reply  I love the 3/4 loft...so much space!
jshane Member	# Posted: 12 Oct 2011 08:26pm Reply  GREAT tip trollbridge! Thanks.

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