[Teppei837]

Im finishing up my basement and am in a dilemma for how to heating and cooling the area. I live in northern NJ and the floor plan for the basement is a U shaped with about 350 sqft of living room, small half bathroom, and 150sqft of office. I wanted to put a simple ductless minisplit but the only location I can put is in the corner of the living room. The living room is about 27 ft x 13, and if i put the ductless mini split then it will be pointing to the narrow side of the room and totally away from where the couch will be. Do you think that the basement will be able to get heated and cooled comfortably even if the ductless mini-split is in that location? My other option is to purchase a concealed ducted mini split and put in the same are by the furnace and routie duct work but thats obviously alot more money and work. what do you guys think?

 

[roughneck]

The ducted minis are usually very slim. They offer air handlers that are much smaller then your used to. So if there’s room above the ceiling the whole air handler could go there. With a small amount of duct.

https://www.samsunghvac.com/light-commercial-residential/slim-duct?ecrzip=19808

The only drawback is they usually aren’t available as small a BTU rating as wall mounts.

 

[Username10]

I finished my basement too near Pittsburgh pa. The exposed boiler pipes and a ceramic heater make it comfortable. I never put any ducts in the bathroom because in my mind i needed more space for routing. In the bedroom(in the basement) i ran an ac duct all the way from the main branch in the attic(where the handler is). Our main ac crapped out so i put a unit in the glass block window. It can get tricky finding the right temp but for the most part it’s very comfortable.

Btw our basement is mostly below grade.

If we ever get a new ac unit I’d like to run the 4 inch flex ducts all over the house and burn the old moldy ones lol.

 

[Brian085]

Your not limited to just wall mount units. There are ceiling and floor mount ones as well.

 

[Teppei837]

So I was on the phone with a HVAC supplier and with my concerns for being able to heat the living room and office, the best option for me is to go with the concealed duct mini split. The unit is going to be a 12,000 BTU Fujitsu. Now, since I want to split the heating and cooling to the living room and the office, what size round flexible duct should I put in each room. Do you think (2) 6” duct to the living room and (1) 6” duct to the office is good? I know this is unit is supposed to be a low static unit. What size return should I make it? I was online all night researching with the ductulator and all but I’m getting confused now. The duct lines will all be less than 10’ long. Im going to have a professional HVAC person come and charge the lines and all but with everything that’s going on and my location, I don’t feel comfortable having someone in my house.

 

[roughneck]

At best that would put you around ~225 CFM, you’ll have to plan on ~400 CFM.

 

[Teppei837]

So do you think (2) 8” or (2) 10” For the living room and a (1) 6” for the office would put out enough?

 

[roughneck]

Normally you’d use a room by room manual D with a manual D to design ductwork.
But your looking to just move enough air to satisfy the needs of the air handler and keep static low.