Fix air flow in single window gallery apartment

Question

In the so called gallery apartment of my friend the hot and bad air accumulates in the upper area in which the bed room is located. The gallery bed room is stacked on top of the bath room and has no inner walls. Unfortunately there is only one window on the ground floor.

Opening the window and the main door helps to ventilate the ground floor but the fresh air doesn’t exchange with the air in the upper area of apartment.

Ground area

|————————————————————————|
|                        / door
/ window door   ————————-|
|               | bath   | 
|        Stairs~| room   |
|———————————————————————-|

Upper area (no floor in between)

|————————————————————————|
|                : bed   |
|                : room  |
|                :       | 
|        Stairs~ :       |
|———————————————————————-|

Legend:

| Wall

: Edge of bedroom floor (no wall)

I tried to put a tower fan in the bedroom but that doesn’t help much. Should I rather try to blow air from the window side in an upwards direction towards the bedroom? Or should I try to blow air from the bedroom towards the window?

How can I fix the air flow to ventilate the bed room? It’s mostly about air quality rather than temperature. Even there is a clear difference in temperature.

Installing a ceiling fan is not an option.

Answer 1

I recommend the following, if the layout permits it:

You can buy a product called dryer duct which is a large flexible tube of corrugated aluminum which is used to connect the exhaust port of a clothes dryer to a feed-thru vent in a wall. By pulling on the tube ends you can stretch it out and increase its length like an accordion and then bend it into curved shapes and around corners. Lengths of it can be grafted together with splices consisting of short bits of rigid aluminum tube that is a slip fit inside the end of the dryer duct, and then held in place with silver duct tape.

You can also buy an electric fan called a muffin fan which is used to cool off electronic gear. These come in various sizes and air moving capacities; you want one that runs on the AC mains voltage in the house.

The dryer duct is soft enough that it is possible to deform one of its ends into a square cross-section that is a slip fit over the squarish external frame of the muffin fan, which was chosen to be large enough to allow a close fit with the squared duct. You fit it into the duct so the fan is pushing air into that end of the duct. You then fix it in place in the end of the duct as best as possible with more duct tape.

When the fan is running it will draw air out of the room and push it into the duct. What you do is position the fan end near the open window and the other end up in the loft area, near the bed, so it will deliver outdoor air into the loft area near the bed.

The duct is lightweight and can be suspended by thin wire that is affixed to the walls and ceiling with picture hanger hooks on small nails. You equip the duct with a hanger every 3 to 4 feet of length. If this sounds worthwhile to you I can furnish photos of how I did this in my shop, if you message me through my webpage (listed in my user profile).

Answer 2

@nielsnielsen already provides you a hack with the flexible tube and the ventilator.

However, the best / proper solution, (even if you do not have he rights to implement it - it is your friend's property) is to have (install) a window in the "bedroom" area (the same wall with the "door"). That window would allow the improper air to be released outside, while fresh air could come inside.

You might suggest you friend to implement such solution, and he might agree to it. Or might not. It is worth a try, anyway.

---

Another hack (less efficient) would be to use two ventilators:

1. One to push the bedroom air downwards towards the "window door";
2. A second ventilator to push the air out through the "window door".