How to Install a Heat Transfer System

If you’ve got a wood burner heating up a room in your house, you can use a heat transfer system to move any excess heat it creates into different rooms and warm them up too. You could also save on heating costs, simply by redirecting heat that would otherwise go to waste – plus, you can install most of it yourself, Easy As.

In this guide we’ll be installing this Weiss 1 room to 3 Room Heat Transfer System. It’ll sit in your ceiling cavity and effectively and quietly move heat to three other rooms in your home. You can also get 1 to 1 room, and up to 1 to 4 room kits – and they’re installed pretty much the same way.

You can do the bulk of the work yourself, and install the vents and all the ducting. But, you will need to get a registered electrician to wire it up, and install the controller.

Draw a plan

• Decide what rooms you want to heat up. You can use it to heat up hallways, bedrooms, and other family areas. It’s not suitable, however, for kitchens or bathrooms as it will push cooking smells or damp air into the rest of the house.
• Draw a plan of your house.
• You’ll need position inlets and outlets so they’re clear of obstacles, timber, wires, insulation, pipes - so you’ll need to get up in the roof to see where they are, and draw them on your plan.
• Before you start walking around in any ceiling it’s a good idea to lay down some planks of wood to walk on – as you do not want to put your foot through your roof, or put weight on somewhere you shouldn’t. So, stay safe, and don’t step off the planks. Also – be careful in older houses as they are likely to have less solid supports to hold your weight.
• Start with your inlet placement. This needs to be positioned at least 1m away from the flue of your fireplace.
• You’ll connect the inlet to the fan-motor with a 3m length of ducting. Any ducting needs to be kept at least 1.5m away from the flue in the ceiling cavity. This length of ducting can’t be more than 3m, and must be a minimum of 1m.
• The fan-motor will need to be suspended at least 150mm above the ceiling or insulation. So, make sure you position it where there’s somewhere to hang it.
• Another length of ducting connects the motor to the junction.
• Off the junction we connect to the outlets in each room. Make sure the ducting to each outlet is the same length so there’s equal airflow to each room. And make sure these lengths are as short as possible – this increases efficiency.
• Your outlets don’t need to be in the centre of each room, a corner is just fine.
• Decide where your controller is going to sit. The best placement is in a convenient location within the room with the heat source, around light switch height. Plus, make sure it isn’t placed in direct sunlight or in a draft, because these could affect the temperature reading. Your electrician can advise on best placement.
• And when you’re drawing up your plan – remember – one of your main aims is to make the system as short as possible, which will make it as efficient as possible.

Installation

Once you’ve drawn your plan, it’s time to put it all together.

Vents

• Use a gib saw to cut a hole 155mm in diameter for inlet vent. The fascia mounting body must fit freely in the hole.
• Make sure where hole is going is clear of obstacles like timber, wires, insulation, pipes.
• Attach the ducting to the rear of the fascia body, secure with provided cable tie. Connect the inner sleeve of the ducting to the vent with the cable tie – then pull over the insulation and outer sleeve of the ducting and tape these onto the fascia body.
• Repeat for each outlet.
• Slide the outlet vent fascia mounting back into place and screw into place using the four 6x3⁄4 pan head screws provided.
• Press the fascia ring onto the body and then screw the centre diffuser into position. Never have these fully closed. About half-way open is good, but make sure all your outlet vents are adjusted the same.
• TIP: When up in the ceiling and have decided where to place your vents, drill a small pilot hole down – this will help you locate the exact position of your vent and mark it out.

Fan-motor

• In the ceiling cavity suspend the fan-motor from the rafters with the heavy duty cable ties supplied. There is a directional arrow on the main fan body showing the flow of air through the inline fan-motor unit. When fitting the ducting, ensure that the arrows on the fan-motor housing are pointing in the direction of the outlet vent.
• Don’t cover the fan-motor with insulation.
• If you have a larger ceiling space you can use a strap to hang the fan-motor.

Ducting

• Now join it all up with cable ties, and tape each join up.
• Have the duct stretched out and as straight as possible.
• Be sure to cut off any excess with a sharp utility blade and wire cutters.
• Support duct and bends from the rafters as necessary.

Install controller

• Now it’s time to get the electrician round to wire it all up, and install the controller.
• The controller allows you to set the temperature at which the heat transfer system will turn on, so you can set and forget.
• And in the case of 3 and 4 room systems, you can select the speed of your fan-motor, and override on/off controls