I have hot water baseboard heat through six zones of my 1930s stone carriage house that was converted to a residence in the 1970s. The main room of the house was completely opened up - cathedral ceiling, open plan, like a barn. Two two-story "wings" on either side are also open, with no doors or walls to really contain those zones. The oil bill has been consistently (for our two years of ownership and previous owner) around $10,000, which will force us to move if not halved. So far we have installed an indirect water heater, replaced half of the windows, and added insulation to walls as we have opened them. We will be putting Quadrifire's biggest woodburning insert in the big hearth in the main room next month. I am making insulated draperies for the 600 feet of sliding glass doors and putting honeycomb blinds on the windows.What we have not done is install any fans to circulate the heat, because I have no confidence in how to do it.

Which brings me to my question. There is a fan (pump??) in an interior wall that we used to hear periodically and seemed to be linked to the upstairs zone. Now we know it is, because the Honeywell programmable thermostat we just installed now triggers it every time the heat goes on there. It stops if I turn off the auto fan on the thermostat. What is this fan or pump inside the wall, and should it be triggered by the thermostat's auto fan? There were no programmable interstats made for houses without a/c, like ours. I was told that it wouldn't matter but now I wonder.

Which brings me to a larger question - in thinking about circulating the heat throughout the house (including the heat we hope will be pouring off the insert), are there better alternatives to suspending big ceiling fans in the main room?

Thank you for any experience or ideas you can share.