Gas and Oil Home Heating Furnaces - Modifying Cold Air Returns
Doityourself.com community forum was created to provide answers to all questions related to home improvement and home repair. Doityourself community can help you find information about how-to topics on small fixes to large remodeling projects. With comprehensive how-to content and expertly moderated community forums DoItYourself.com makes it easy to tackle even the most complex home improvement projects.View Full Version : Modifying Cold Air Returns
01-14-02, 12:19 PM
I have an ~1500 sq. ft. ranch home with full basement in Colorado with forced air heat and central air. Currently, there are two cold air returns, one located in a kitchen wall and one located about 9 feet away in a hallway. The main cold air return duct runs the length of the house, parallel and almost directly under these two walls/returns. I am removing the kitchen wall, so I need to change the cold air return. I am not sure what to do with it.
The easiest solution would be to open it to the basement and return off the basement directly into the main cold air return line. Would this create any problems? Are there any building codes that I may be violating?
Option two would be to move the cold air return from the kitchen wall to the dining room wall. This wall is about 5 feet away from the main duct and perpendicular to it (and only about 3 feet away from the existing cold air return), so I'd have to run a duct over to it and rotate the return 90 degrees.
Option three is to move the cold air return to a bedroom at the other end of the house. This allows me to stay along the main duct, but it does move the return about 25 feet from where it is currently.
Which option is best? :confused:
The easiest solution would be to open it to the basement and return off the basement directly into the main cold air return line. Would this create any problems? Are there any building codes that I may be violating?
Option two would be to move the cold air return from the kitchen wall to the dining room wall. This wall is about 5 feet away from the main duct and perpendicular to it (and only about 3 feet away from the existing cold air return), so I'd have to run a duct over to it and rotate the return 90 degrees.
Option three is to move the cold air return to a bedroom at the other end of the house. This allows me to stay along the main duct, but it does move the return about 25 feet from where it is currently.
Which option is best? :confused: