Furnace vs Gas Fireplace

[bassNspear]

I live in a townhome that was built 10 years ago, and im wondering if you all think its less expensive to run the furnace over the fireplace, or vis vera

Thanks

[Surface Tension]

If this was a primary heat source then the fireplace won't come close.

Your furnace heat exchanger is sucking as much warm air out as it can.

Your burners are designed burn the gas efficiently with a clean blue flame

Your gas fireplace is letting a lot of heat escape out the flue. Depending on the fireplace it also isn't getting and efficient clean burn.

Lets say you keep every room cool except a room you gather in and spend most of your time.

Using the fireplace as additional heat there as opposed to heating the whole house to that higher temp with the furnace, then yes you'll save money. You would save more on zone management with the furnace though.

Lets be realistic about space heating, if your married it takes a special women that prefers a cold bedroom or bathroom. Someone is going to turn the heat up.

[BoxMN]

What we sometimes do at the cabin, which has gas furnace and fireplace, is run the fireplace in main room, with the furnace thermostat set to where we want it at nighttime, and just run the furnace fan ON so it redistributes the heat from fireplace all over. Then at night, we turn the fireplace off and go to bed. If the furnace needs to kick on it will, but it takes awhile for the room to cool down to where that needs to be. Keeping the fan on keeps the heat circulating so the other rooms aren't cold spots. Not sure how the extra electricity for furnace fan factors in though

Only way it gets cold is if we leave fireplace ON and furnace fan OFF and then close the bedroom doors. Main rooms get hot, and bedrooms get cold and furnace never kicks on due to temp at the thermostat being too high.

Good luck.

[bassNspear]

thanks all for the information!

[Archerysniper]

What we sometimes do at the cabin, which has gas furnace and fireplace, is run the fireplace in main room, with the furnace thermostat set to where we want it at nighttime, and just run the furnace fan ON so it redistributes the heat from fireplace all over. Then at night, we turn the fireplace off and go to bed. If the furnace needs to kick on it will, but it takes awhile for the room to cool down to where that needs to be. Keeping the fan on keeps the heat circulating so the other rooms aren't cold spots. Not sure how the extra electricity for furnace fan factors in though

Only way it gets cold is if we leave fireplace ON and furnace fan OFF and then close the bedroom doors. Main rooms get hot, and bedrooms get cold and furnace never kicks on due to temp at the thermostat being too high.

Good luck.

This is how I'm heating my house now except I'm useing a corn stove and leaving it set at low,it's working great. It will really be put to the test around thanksgiving we got some good ice making weather moveing in. Just trying to save on buying more propane that stuff isn't getting any cheaper.

[spearchucker]

Gas fireplace is nowhere near as efficient as a furnace (even an old one).

[LightningBG]

What we sometimes do at the cabin, which has gas furnace and fireplace, is run the fireplace in main room, with the furnace thermostat set to where we want it at nighttime, and just run the furnace fan ON so it redistributes the heat from fireplace all over. Then at night, we turn the fireplace off and go to bed. If the furnace needs to kick on it will, but it takes awhile for the room to cool down to where that needs to be. Keeping the fan on keeps the heat circulating so the other rooms aren't cold spots. Not sure how the extra electricity for furnace fan factors in though

Having the heat from the fireplace distribute throughout the house/cabin defeats the purpose of not using the furnace. If you want the whole house warm, use the furnace. It is the most efficient producer of heat in the house. If you only need 1 room warm and are willing to let the others get cold, use the fireplace, because all of the heat is going into the one room.

[BoxMN]

Hi LighningBG. Yep, I understand that and good info for heating purposes, but when we want the "look and feel" of the fireplace, it actually even gets too hot at times in the room even with the flame set fairly low. So we just do this when the fireplace is on and it gets too warm. To get heat into the place quick, or when we are not "enjoying the fire" we do use the furnace, as it is high efficiency anyway, and we have off peak wirsbo in the basement... but if we have the fireplace on anyway, might as well spread the "warmth"

Happy T-Day to everybody tomorrow!

[Surface Tension]

A gas fireplace is a luxury the way I see it, I think most people feel that way

Its going to cost to use it when you want that look and feel. Nothing wrong with that.

Box, Happy Thanksgiving to you and everyone.

[harvey lee]

I had one put in our living room when we built the house. We leave the house at about 66 and then use the gas fireplace for the living room as we spend the majority of our time there.

We can sleep in a bedroom at 66 with no problems.

Happty T-Day and safe travels.

[bassNspear]

how much does the gas fireplace cost when its running