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re: inexpensive retrofitting....
28 sep 2003
jnj wrote:
>a sunspace has definitely been an option we're considering. the house here
>is uniquely situated -- first, it's an urban setting with houses on small
>plots and all sitting on their property lines. that means the sun space
>would have to go in front or in back...
unless it's very shallow, eg transparent "solar siding" over a 6" air gap.
>if you were to draw a line from north to south, it would intersect the
>center line of the house (side-to-side) with about a 60 degree angle
>facing west.
i'm not sure how an angle "faces west." like this, viewed in a fixed font?
back
s . w
. 60 .
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front n
>we have a small addition on the back that serves as a laundry room -- we'll
>be remodeling it this year to make it more sturdy, and next year it will get
>a new roof as well. one thing i've thought of doing is creating a sunspace
>behind it and tieing in through the laundry room or adding some skylights in
>the laundry room to increase it's sun access.
>
>is there any value in adding skylights, domes or other similar breaks in a
>roof?
sure. about 4% of the floorspace for daylighting as high windows, and so on.
sun optics prismatic skylights transmit 40% more light than others, with no
hot spots. they ship the equivalent of 1 mw/week of fluorescents in wal-mart
roofs and other places...
for heating, on your small lot, you might go up, with vertical glazing, eg
south-facing clerestory windows above an ew ridgeline. most of them might be
"dummy windows" with bare hydronic absorber plates behind them and insulation
behind the plates.
nick
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