Q: Dear Jim: We have a two-story house, and some rooms are always too warm or too cool. What can we do ourselves with add-on devices to help without driving up the utility bills?

- Carol K.

A: Dear Carol: Your problem of uneven room temperatures is very common, but fortunately it can be corrected by several methods. No matter which method you decide upon, you will save energy. When one room is uncomfortably warm during summer or cool during winter, the thermostat gets set either lower or higher respectively. This drives up your utility bills year-round.

The first step is to check for duct system leaks that you can seal. If much of the cooled or heated air is leaking out into the utility room, basement, or attic, and not getting to the rooms, you will definitely have different room temperatures.

To check ducts, switch on the blower at the thermostat and close the registers in the rooms. This will create higher pressure in the ducts, which allows you to feel air blowing out leaky areas. Pay particular attention to joints and where the ducts meet the lumber framing. Seal the leaky areas with aluminum-type duct tape or a thick mastic sealer. You should be able to find the sealer at a heating contractor. Do not use grey, cloth type duct tape. It will not provide a long-lasting seal.

Once the leaks are sealed, check the damper baffles in the ducts. Most systems have them and you can locate them by looking for short damper handles on the ducts near the blower. If you don't have them, you can easily install them in the ducts.

Put all the damper handles in the fully-open position and check the various room temperatures with a thermometer. If a room or two are too cool during summer, close the dampers slightly in the ducts leading to those rooms so less cooled air reaches them. You will have to change the damper settings from summer to winter.

The most efficient and convenient fix for the problem of uneven temperatures is an add-on automatic zoning system. This allows you to set different temperatures in different rooms. The comfort effect is similar to having individual furnaces and air conditioners in each room.

During winter, people generally prefer it a little warmer in a living room, family room, or dining room, where they relax and are inactive. Since the kitchen, laundry, play, and work rooms are more active areas,

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they are more comfortable when kept cooler. Bathrooms can be a few degrees cooler except for morning showers. You will need to change the room temperatures for the summer season.

Some zoning systems allow you, using a control panel or room thermostats, to program the rooms' temperatures throughout the day. For example, the living room temperature is increased during the evening when it is used. The bedrooms can be kept warmer at bedtime and morning, but cooler during the day. The kitchen is set cooler overnight.

By keeping the room temperatures in the comfortable range only when you're using them, less energy is required to keep your house warm during winter and cool during summer. This can cut your year-round utility bills by 10 to 20 percent and increase the life of your furnace and air conditioner.

Zoning kits are simple devices.

They include thermostats in rooms or zones (groups of rooms), which are wired by safe low-voltage wire to the main controller. This is connected to mechanical dampers that fit in the ducts. When the thermostat in a chilly room calls for heat, the furnace starts. Dampers in the ducts to other rooms stay closed so heat goes to only the chilly room.

The simplest, least-expensive zoning systems may have just two zones with several rooms in each. These use dampers that switch from fully opened to fully closed positions. A two-story home may have a first-floor and a second-floor zone. Other systems use dampers in several rooms in the house.

The most sophisticated systems use modulating dampers that vary the open duct area instead of being simply all or nothing. This provides more even room temperatures. If your home has a temperature variation between the first and second floors, consider a system with automatic recirculation.

The most comfortable zoning systems have an automatic changeover feature to switch from heating to cooling during spring and fall. These may run the central air conditioner briefly during the day to cool only the kitchen and then start the furnace during a chilly evening to efficiently heat only the bedrooms.

Write for (instantly download - www.dulley.com) Utility Bills Up -date No. 589 - buyer's guide of 12 zoning system manufacturers listing number of zones, type and size of dampers, control/comfort features, and a utility bills savings chart with zoning. Please include $3 and a business-size SASE. James Dulley, Illinois Country Living, 6906 Royalgreen Dr., Cincinnati, OH 45244.

James Dulley is a mechanical engineer who writes on a wide variety of energy and utility topics. His column appears in a large number of daily newspapers.