Ceiling fan
This afternoon I installed a little ceiling fan in my first/second story stairwell. I'm hoping that moving air from the lower level, where the HVAC seems to do a good job of heating/cooling, to the second story will help to keep the upstairs cooler in the summer and warmer in the winter.
I got a little 32" Hampton Bay White Minuet II fan. I'm glad that I decided to get the 32" model, and not the 36" model, because even though the stairwell is 39" across, there is a ceiling joist in the exact wrong spot if you want to mount something in the middle of the stairwell. The fan needs to be offset to the left a couple of inches, and that just wouldn't have been possible with a 36" fan.
The tricky part of the whole thing was how to get to the ceiling in the stairwell. Normal ladders don't work, and a Little Giant ladder that does work on stairs costs about $350. That's a lot of hardware to install a $40 fan. Luckily I was able to rent one in Hudson for only $30 a day.
To save some time in the attic (which is like 140 degrees today) I got a remote control for the fan. That meant that I didn't have to wire in a switch and made the install considerably simpler (if you discount the standing 10' in the air on a wacky ladder part). There was plenty of slack in the wire that I had run months earlier to power the new outlets I put in for the towel warmers, which was nice since I didn't have to do anything other than just cut that wire at the new box for the ceiling fan. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to get that box quite level. Since I was mounting it from the attic, I couldn't really see how it was fitting with respect to the drywall. It's not perfect, but it's passable (I wonder how I could have done a better job -- screw a board below the box to give me a level reference point?). Considering that it's nearly 16' up in the air, I don't think too many people will immediately notice it (though if you look, it's clear there's a gap on one side). The fan sits on a ball mount, so it hangs level, even if its mount isn't. I've got the ladder for another 16 hours, so maybe I'll make another stab at before I return the ladder.
The cool thing about the remote is that it can dim the light on the fan, turn the light off after a specified period of time, but most importantly, it can automatically control the fan speed based temperature.
Now the only thing left to do is adjust/balance the fan blades. At least one of them must not be quite level because you can really see the fan blades going up and down as it spins.
It's really moving a fair amount of air though, and it's far more quiet than the fan I had sitting on the floor, so even if things stay as they are now, I'll be quite happy with it.
I got a little 32" Hampton Bay White Minuet II fan. I'm glad that I decided to get the 32" model, and not the 36" model, because even though the stairwell is 39" across, there is a ceiling joist in the exact wrong spot if you want to mount something in the middle of the stairwell. The fan needs to be offset to the left a couple of inches, and that just wouldn't have been possible with a 36" fan.
The tricky part of the whole thing was how to get to the ceiling in the stairwell. Normal ladders don't work, and a Little Giant ladder that does work on stairs costs about $350. That's a lot of hardware to install a $40 fan. Luckily I was able to rent one in Hudson for only $30 a day.
To save some time in the attic (which is like 140 degrees today) I got a remote control for the fan. That meant that I didn't have to wire in a switch and made the install considerably simpler (if you discount the standing 10' in the air on a wacky ladder part). There was plenty of slack in the wire that I had run months earlier to power the new outlets I put in for the towel warmers, which was nice since I didn't have to do anything other than just cut that wire at the new box for the ceiling fan. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to get that box quite level. Since I was mounting it from the attic, I couldn't really see how it was fitting with respect to the drywall. It's not perfect, but it's passable (I wonder how I could have done a better job -- screw a board below the box to give me a level reference point?). Considering that it's nearly 16' up in the air, I don't think too many people will immediately notice it (though if you look, it's clear there's a gap on one side). The fan sits on a ball mount, so it hangs level, even if its mount isn't. I've got the ladder for another 16 hours, so maybe I'll make another stab at before I return the ladder.
The cool thing about the remote is that it can dim the light on the fan, turn the light off after a specified period of time, but most importantly, it can automatically control the fan speed based temperature.
Now the only thing left to do is adjust/balance the fan blades. At least one of them must not be quite level because you can really see the fan blades going up and down as it spins.
It's really moving a fair amount of air though, and it's far more quiet than the fan I had sitting on the floor, so even if things stay as they are now, I'll be quite happy with it.
posted by Mark at 4:03 PM
2 Comments:
Towel warmers?!
Towel warmers rule! Although I have to admit, as summer rolls around, I'm less inclined to want a warm towel than I was in Winter. Also, the warmers are nice in humid weather because they make sure that the towels actually dry in the time allotted, which otherwise would be questionable.
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