Is it a good idea to put a draft stopper in under bedroom doors?

[Zeze]

I noticed my bedroom doors all have a 1/8"~ gap at bottom. The heating vent thingy (long rails on the floor) are only in bedrooms, not in the hallway where the thermostat is located.

At night, I see lots of heat bleeding out. Is it okay to block them? I have some kind of fear that some level of air circulation is needed for oxygen or prevent carbon-monoxide buildup or whatever.

Do your homes have gap at bottom?

 

[nakedfrog]

I think the biggest problem I see here is that your thermostat is not located in an area where there are heater vents. If you block all heat going to the area where the thermostat is, it has no reason to stop running because it still thinks it's cold. It would probably tend to make your room rather warm.

 

[feralkid]

Really? You can see heat?

Snakeman?

But seriously, the answer is "NO".



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[waffleironhead]

Unless you have cold air returns in those rooms, you are going to impede the air circulation in the house.

Your concerns about oxygen and CO in regards to blocking the bottom of the door are unnecessary.

 

[Zeze]

Unless you have cold air returns in those rooms, you are going to impede the air circulation in the house.

Your concerns about oxygen and CO in regards to blocking the bottom of the door are unnecessary.

Sorry forgot to mention, it's a 3 zone heating. We only put the bedrooms (upstairs)in higher heat due to infant baby (67-69 degrees).

So impeding air circulation while sleeping has no effect, it keeps us toasty. We don't care about rest of the house which naturally stays high 50s anyway from residual heat.

So overall, there shouldn't be any negatives for putting draft stoppers for all 4 beds yes?

 

[GagHalfrunt]

No negatives, you're not going to come close to creating a tight enough seal to worry about oxygen and CO2 levels

 

[Kwatt]

I noticed my bedroom doors all have a 1/8"~ gap at bottom. The heating vent thingy (long rails on the floor) are only in bedrooms, not in the hallway where the thermostat is located.

At night, I see lots of heat bleeding out. Is it okay to block them? I have some kind of fear that some level of air circulation is needed for oxygen or prevent carbon-monoxide buildup or whatever.

Do your homes have gap at bottom?

Not unless you have return air for each room.

If you don't and most houses don't. The HVAC unit will not be working at the best efficiency unless you leave the door open.

Quick and easy test for airflow:
Cut a 1 inch wide strip of TP and tape it in front of the air vent.
Watch as the air moves the TP around. Open the door and see if the TP moves a good bit more. If it does the air is not returning to the HVAC unit at peak.

You can't blow air into a place unless air can flow out.

It will cut your energy and maint. to allow better airflow.


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[Carson Dyle]

You have the thermostat in the hallway, but no heating vents out there. And you want to keep _any_ of the warm air from escaping the bedrooms into the hall? Sounds like all you're going to accomplish is make it very difficult to regulate the temperature.

When we put in A/C a few years back, there wasn't a convenient way to run a new thermostat line to the furnace controller, so we installed a wireless thermostat. It normally sits on the wall downstairs, but I can easily remove it from the mount and take it upstairs and keep it on my nightstand at night. I'm not sure it makes any real difference in cost savings, but it does make it much easier keep the desired temperature in bedroom. (I keep it at 60 at night.)

 

[dullard]

You can't blow air into a place unless air can flow out.

Exactly. In order to heat your bedrooms with vents, you need to blow hot air in. In order to blow hot air in, you need to suck cold air out. If you block the way for air to go out, then you are (A) going to get terrible temperature control in your blocked-off room and (B) spend a lot of money trying to run a heater with no where for the hot air to go. That isn't good for the furnace / heat pump and can lead to an expensive early failure.

Now, if you have properly sized (and unblocked) air returns, then you can probably block the door gap. Just realize that your bedrooms will likely fluctuate more in temperature and you'll likely not save much money at all.

Air quality (i.e. oxygen content) isn't a concern as long as your furnace doesn't have a blocked exhaust.

 

[Zeze]

I don't have vents. These rails which are very common in Northeast are just heated heat sinks aren't they? These rails Def don't push out air by any means

 

[lxskllr]

I don't have vents. These rails which are very common in Northeast are just heated heat sinks aren't they? These rails Def don't push out air by any means

Rails? You're talking about baseboard radiators, right?

 

[Zeze]

Rails? You're talking about baseboard radiators, right?

Yea these, right? I googled baseboard radiator.

As I can see, just heated pipes dissipating heat through the sinks. I don't see any forced air movement by the furnace.

So by this logic, air circulation is not a factor here, right? There shouldn't be any stress on the furnace & heat pump or whatever because it's not forcing any air movement by design.

 

[lxskllr]

Yea these, right? I googled baseboard radiator.

As I can see, just heated pipes dissipating heat through the sinks. I don't see any forced air movement by the furnace.

Correct. They just radiate heat(bit of clever naming there :^P ). Nothing will hurt by blocking the gap, but I'm not sure how much it'll help either. Stick a towel under the door, and see if you notice a difference. If you want to persist with it, you can buy/make something more "professional".

 

[dullard]

I think we were confused by your mention of vents in the original post.

Block the doors if you wish. But, since heat rises, you aren't going to get too much benefit by blocking air flow down low. You might actually get more benefit by putting in a low-speed fan to get the heat off your ceiling down to where you sleep.

The gap at the bottom of doors helps with many things, and forced air flow is one major benefit. All of my doors have them.