Picking The Right Fireplace Blower Insert For Your Needs

A fireplace blower insert is a wise investment these days. With heating oil and electricity costs on the rise and Winters apparently getting worse, inserting an add-on heat blower just makes good economic sense. Sure, your wood or gas fireplace adds beauty to your home, but a lot homeowners fail to take full advantage of the more practical, money-saving uses.

It's not widely understood, but fireplaces are actually poor heat radiators. Most of the heat from the fire within the fireplace "cave" escapes up the flue.

That's why a blower insert is so effective. It reverses this heat exhange, causing the heat the burning wood or gas produces to radiate out into the home, and saving you a ton of money on your monthly heating or electricity bills!

So, what should you look for when shopping for the best insert for your fireplace and heating needs? While there are many factors, the most important include: cost, correct fit, reputation of the product, and correct blower strength for your home.

Cost

Fireplace inserts run the gamut, from surprisingly inexpensive to pretty costly. Expect to pay $100-$500 for most models. If you need someone to install it for you, obviously the cost will rise substantially. But really, most models are pretty ‘do-it-yourself friendly.’ As with most products, remember that the old adage, ‘You get what you pay for’ holds true with fireplace blowers as much as anything else. Spend enough to get a high quality insert the first time and you’ll avoid spending over and over on replacements and repairs. And, of course, you’re recoup the one-time cost in heating bill savings pretty quickly.

Fit

You’ll want to do your homework a bit before you invest in a new blower. Make sure the model you’ve got your eye on is appropriate for your type of fireplace and its surrounding environment. Different blower inserts are made for gas vs. wood burning fireplaces in many cases. When in doubt, ask a pro or consult the accompanying literature for models that mention your type of fireplace and the brand of blower you currently have.

Reputation

Once you narrow down your blower choices to a handful of possibilities, a good rule of thumb is to go with the model with the best reputation. The Web is your best friend when it comes to such things. Do some searches for that model of fireplace insert to see what others who own it have to say. You’ll quickly get a good idea which are best. If there’s any question or you can’t decide between a couple of blowers that seem like excellent buys (under $100), ask an expert which one he/she would buy for their own home.

Blower Strength

The final consideration is how much heat the fireplace blower insert is pushing out into your home. This is pretty straightforward. If you have a smaller home or one that is in a part of the country where Winters are not harsh, then you can get by with a less powerful blower. For larger square footage and colder Winters, you’ll want a heavy duty model. Another factor is your type of fireplace. Gas burners put out more consistent heat levels, whereas wood burning fireplaces spike up and down in terms of heat output. All blowers regulate this to a large extent, but not perfectly. You might be fine, even in an area with bad Winters, using one of the less powerful blower inserts if you burn wood logs.

Here’s a short video describing one user’s experience with a popular fireplace blower in his home: