I'm about to get deep into a basement renovation project that I started work on last year and left alone for a while. The basement was very poorly finished by the previous owners and I've ripped out a lot of what was there (and more will get ripped down shortly). One major source of indecision I have is on how to treat the supply and return trunks that run along one of the exterior walls. I had originally decided that I would box them in as-is, but then my gears started turning.
The house is fairly old and is ducted a bit strangely (but does stay perfectly comfortable year-round). The main (and pretty much only) return is right by the front door. The 8x24" trunk runs from the furnace room, close to the exterior wall, to the gigantic intake vent in the floor. The more interior 8x12" trunk is a supply and feeds a small 2nd floor bedroom, 2 bathrooms, and one of two living room vents. Another very short 8x12" trunk within the furnace room (not pictured) feeds the rest of the house.
Here you can see the return swoop up into the giant floor vent.
See that 6" supply duct popping up and heading away between the joists on the left side? That goes up to a vent in the 2nd floor hallway AND to a vent in a small bedroom which already has another supply. I'm thinking whoever installed the system screwed up and these vents were actually supposed to be returns, since there are no other returns on the 2nd floor. I'm thinking I could easily change that run to connect to the return trunk.
To the furnace room, I replaced the crappy bifold louvered furnace room door with an exterior door and added a layer of 5/8 drywall with green glue to that wall. As you can see I had a little fun trying to fit a full-height door between the existing ducting.(I'm fully aware of the air supply implications of sealing off the furnace room and am dealing with that with outside supply air)
The big return trunk takes up a lot of headroom and is a soundproofing burden. It also inhibits me (but perhaps doesn't fully prevent) installing an egress window in that wall. My big IF, right now, is what IF I moved the big return vent all the way from the front door to the other side of the living room, making it so the big swoop is within the furnace room (practically right above the return drop) and that whole trunk disappeared. The downsides are: I'd have to patch/match some very old oak flooring, I'd probably hear more furnace noise in my living room tv area, I would no longer have that return trunk to tap off of for the 2nd floor and basement returns, and the new return vent would also be very close to the fireplace. Having the supply trunk there is pretty unavoidable (in fact, I think I'll need it to add a couple basement supply vents) so it's not like I'd win my whole ceiling back. Would any effort at simply making the ducts narrower and wider be worth the trouble? I guess I could move the ducts closer together.
Anyways, since a lot of folk here deal with these kinds of augmentations (I've read through a few ducting threads already) I'd love to hear your thoughts.
This space will be used as office space at first, then probably become a bedroom one day, or possibly a second family room type area. I plan on building it with bedroom in mind. I'll definitely be putting drywall/gg up against the subfloor.
Thanks!
The house is fairly old and is ducted a bit strangely (but does stay perfectly comfortable year-round). The main (and pretty much only) return is right by the front door. The 8x24" trunk runs from the furnace room, close to the exterior wall, to the gigantic intake vent in the floor. The more interior 8x12" trunk is a supply and feeds a small 2nd floor bedroom, 2 bathrooms, and one of two living room vents. Another very short 8x12" trunk within the furnace room (not pictured) feeds the rest of the house.
Here you can see the return swoop up into the giant floor vent.
See that 6" supply duct popping up and heading away between the joists on the left side? That goes up to a vent in the 2nd floor hallway AND to a vent in a small bedroom which already has another supply. I'm thinking whoever installed the system screwed up and these vents were actually supposed to be returns, since there are no other returns on the 2nd floor. I'm thinking I could easily change that run to connect to the return trunk.
To the furnace room, I replaced the crappy bifold louvered furnace room door with an exterior door and added a layer of 5/8 drywall with green glue to that wall. As you can see I had a little fun trying to fit a full-height door between the existing ducting.(I'm fully aware of the air supply implications of sealing off the furnace room and am dealing with that with outside supply air)
The big return trunk takes up a lot of headroom and is a soundproofing burden. It also inhibits me (but perhaps doesn't fully prevent) installing an egress window in that wall. My big IF, right now, is what IF I moved the big return vent all the way from the front door to the other side of the living room, making it so the big swoop is within the furnace room (practically right above the return drop) and that whole trunk disappeared. The downsides are: I'd have to patch/match some very old oak flooring, I'd probably hear more furnace noise in my living room tv area, I would no longer have that return trunk to tap off of for the 2nd floor and basement returns, and the new return vent would also be very close to the fireplace. Having the supply trunk there is pretty unavoidable (in fact, I think I'll need it to add a couple basement supply vents) so it's not like I'd win my whole ceiling back. Would any effort at simply making the ducts narrower and wider be worth the trouble? I guess I could move the ducts closer together.
Anyways, since a lot of folk here deal with these kinds of augmentations (I've read through a few ducting threads already) I'd love to hear your thoughts.
This space will be used as office space at first, then probably become a bedroom one day, or possibly a second family room type area. I plan on building it with bedroom in mind. I'll definitely be putting drywall/gg up against the subfloor.
Thanks!