900 square foot earth bermed house upstate ny | Page 4 | Construction and DIY projects | Forums

Gravel Road, without scrolling back, what is the house's orientation? It may not bee to late to incorporate passive solar. All you need is a primarily south facing wall with some glazing that will be in shade during the summer and get direct sunlight in the winter. To do this, you just have to size the overhang properly.

Other options are to use sky tubes or skylights with little tents over them that accomplish the same thing.

Its funny you mention the east orientation.  Do what fits the site!  I to be honest did not get the orientation right. It actually has a "bit" of south west orientation.  I've since come to the conclusion that i should have angled it 20 degree's more to the east. The east(south east) is where alll the action is (solar wise).  Like you said gravel the prevailing winds come from the west.  The mornings usually clear and sunny after noons usually windy and overcast. I  've noticed that when sun starts setting clouds generally form and the blustery windows from the west pick up and you don't gain much anyway from any western exposure.  So from your descriptions, I think you have the orientation nailed.  I wish mine was different but it is what it is now so I'll just make do.  The books just say face south..well..it depends.  The benefit is that kids rooms (northern wall with basement casements on it get some early morning sun b/c its kind of north east a bit.  Its nice to have light come in your room so maybe thats a benefit.  It bothers me but whatever ..move on...tweak a bit. 

Solar seems to charge our house up a couple of degrees each day latley.  I think it could be more but the amount of mass we have in this house is huge so i think that is why.  I still got years of tweaks to take this house to next level.  I have high expectations for this place.

DOnt even sweat it .  Its all good talk that needs to be said and really an active place is better then a stagnant b/c it keeps KVR feeling like his energyl is well spent lol 😀

.  The challenege with any passive solar house is that the same window that gives you gain becomes a hole in your house at night.  I've tried to fix this with the passive annual heat storage.  Hait mentiones in his book and it made a great deal of sense to me  that, why try to capture sulnlight in the winter when their is the little-ist amount ...instead use summer sun and massive amounts of mass to take the energy into the winter.

To compliment this, Im also working on a solar/compost mass and water charging area (think jean pain compost pile) I left part of the umbrella outside of my house with no insulation and just a water membrane.  The spring water gravity feeds through this mound that is thermally bridged into the insulated earth around house .(imagine a woodchip heat 6 foot tall with black poly pipes) to warm water to save on electric.  Its also tied into the thermal mass around my house so it will/should also charge that mass heating it by slow biological burn.  Fuel is woodchips then onto gardens as compost!  I think i will also add a greenhouse over said mound so i can also get some passive solar AND heat/buffer temp of the greenhouse.  I gots to get woodchips soon...shit another thing on the list.

I'm also  in the process of adding green house plastic to all window frames .  This will be done seasonally... when its sunny opening the regualr windows will allow heat in..then shutting them tight when its night and maybe/probably a well done insulated curtain on the inside as well.  You can have r100 walls but when your in winter and you got a window thats r1..i'm of the impression is doesn't make that much difference.  The weakest link is what matters.  WE have a lot of windows (didn't want to be in a cave) so I need to address this in a simple/seasonal/beutiful way to lower heat losses in winter.  I figured the mass would carry us a bit more then i've seen so far but its now the first winter with insulation umbrella /skirting done so i'm internest to see how the next few years go.