I purchased a 2 story fixer-upper. I had the old coal-oil furnace removed for an electric heater and heat pump. This was connected to the existing ductwork. The duct work for the upstairs went through the wall in to the attic and branched off into four 6" ducts to the different rooms. The stairway apparenty was used for the return.

I wasn't a big fan of running the duct in the attic, which would lose heat and cold. I since have worked on remodeling the house and eliminated the duct running to the attic. I was planning to run new duct work for the upstairs in individual ducts through the wall cavities.

Is this the best way to heat and cool the 2nd level? The air handler is supposed to be large enough to push the air upstairs, but after reading about some problems with similar situations, should I do something else with the upstairs? Is the split level a/c the answer with 700 sq. ft. between 5 rooms upstairs?

I eventually will remodel the upstairs and insulate it well, but I want to know if I should run the ductwork to floor diffusers upstairs and use the stairway for a return, or plan for an different system alltogather.

Thanks,
Ryan

While the ductwork in the attic would be less than ideal for heating, it would have been satisfactory for cooling. To make the ductwork in the attic retain heat like being inside the structure, an option would have been to insulate the attic ductwork to R-22 as should be the least insulation for the attic.

The running of a trunk to branch to the rooms through the attic was done to avoid extensive work in distributing air to the upstairs rooms by enclosing a soffited main at the ceiling-inner wall of the downstairs, then running branches out to the outside upstairs walls through the ceiling. Without the attic duct, the soffited main that is used in many houses is still the best option for heat, when there is no attic distribution.

It requires 2-1/2 times more air flow to cool than to heat with a furnace, so floor heat for the upstairs requires that the air flow be restricted for heating season as to not overheat the upstairs.

http://www.heatpro.us/service/splitlevel.htm

If you do not do adequate cooling through the floor registers for all the rooms by making the upstairs floor ducts and registers just enough for balanced heating upstairs and down, then you could use a ductless split ceiling cassette AC in the larger upstairs room with some extension runs from the cassette for three nearer other rooms.

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