Which direction for passive solar

OK this is a pretty basic question and it's causing a bit of tension around the old homestead here. If we are building a rectangular house and want the front-one of the long sides-to face the best direction for passive solar use, where should it face?? We cannot go completely solar and also want a view of the mountains so have to come up with a happy medium--but we are in Southern Colorado and to not take advantage of the sun would be silly!
Please help!!

also in alternative energy

[Mid Tn Mama]

Put your windows and longest wall facing due south. You will get the best passive solar benefit from the sun that way. Also, build trellises so that summer vines can shade those windows.

[SolarGary]

Hi,
Due south is ideal, but anywhere from SE to SW is OK, and works nearly as well
Some people like to bias it toward the SE, because then the solar heating starts up earlier in the morning.
Some people like to put the area they spend most of their morning time in (kitchen?) on the SE corner of the house so it gets sun early.

"The Solar House" listed here is a good one to get started:
http://www.builditsolar.com/Projects...s/guidesps.htm

If the views are not to the south, think about using some of the simple active solar schemes to allow collecting solar without having a lot of south window -- some of these things would integrate well into a south facing wall. Quite a few schemes here:
http://www.builditsolar.com/Projects...ce_Heating.htm

Gary




Gary

[Freeholder]

Also consider having a very small window frame the view, or having to go outside to a porch to see it. You'll actually appreciate a beautiful view more if it's not in sight all the time -- it becomes 'background noise' after a while.

If possible, have a deep porch on the west end of the house for afternoon shade in the summer.

Kathleen

[Wolf mom]

Get the book:

The Solar Greenhouse Book by James C. McCullagh

It tells you everything you will need to know to put a solar greenhouse on your house.

It actually needs to go within 12 degrees of true SOUTH on your house. You need to be able to get sun to the back wall it in the winter so orientation is important to warm it with the sun low on the horizon. What Gary said about the SE is correct for the winter sun warmth.

Glazing is most important as most windows today are coated or if double paned, are low-e rated & won't let in enough sun rays for optimum growing.

You also need to decide if you want a sun room or a true greenhouse. Will you be using water barrels to warm it in the winter nights?

I recently finished a class by an associate of McCullagh's, and wish I had planned for this first before my house was up.

[raymilosh]

There is room for both a view and a passive solar orientation.
Definitely orient the house properly...there's really no easy way to fix it if its wrong and it is really easy and cheap to have passive solar when its right. Any orientation within 15 degrees of south is best. East is preferable.
I wouldn't sacrifice a lifetime of solar heated comfort just to have a view.

Make the house passive solar and place additional windows elsewhere for the view, placing the view windows strategically, where you know you'll take the time to sit and appreciate it. Even plan to put sitting/appreciating areas near the windows with the view. All that being said, though I agree with Bluejuniper's recommendation, too. I find i appreciate a thing more when its a special treat....ice cream, for example

[ErinP]

Good advice so far so I'll just add, Be careful not to over glaze.
Too many people go overboard on so. windows and cook themselves out!

[Mallow]

Also be very careful picking out your windows. The southern windows you want high solar heat gain if you have an overhang that blocks the sun in the summer.

Thanks everyone--just wanted to clear up a wee dispute here. We started out last summer wanting as much passive solar as we could and tweaked it a bit to maximize the view. Somehow now DH forgot all the previous discussions and had himself set on the idea that the best solar would be East- West, he was just going with the sun rises in the east sets in the west--his memory has now kicked in and he has seen the passive solar light so all is good on this front now.
Thank you all so much-you always have the answers.

[RVcook]

Our home faces SW and has 2 sets of 38W X 64L in the wall. We get a LOT of passive solar heat in the winter. So much so, that this past winter, we didn't even have to fire up the wood furnace since temps in the house remained in the upper 70's for most of the day.

HOWEVER...this is definitely the wrong direction as our summer heat gain is intolerable.

When you are considering the proper orientation, also think about the size of the windows as they relate to your soffit overhang and/or porch. In our case, we will be retrofitting our windows this summer with solar screens to stop the massive heat from getting into the house through the windows, but our future plans include a small porch to shade the windows in summer.

If I were the one originally siting this house, I would have oriented it more SE not only to take advantage of the view but to get the early day sun and bypass most of the heat during the summer. Maybe next house...

RVcook

[ErinP]

BTW, so far as orientation, designing window size, overhangs, etc. I found this tool absolutely invaluable:
http://www.susdesign.com/overhang/
You have to plug in your coordinates (use Google maps) and then you can fiddle with the direction you're facing, time of day, time of year, window height/width, porch/overhang, etc.

Super, super tool!

[highlands]

Originally Posted by littlebit ranch

If we are building a rectangular house and want the front-one of the long sides-to face the best direction for passive solar use, where should it face??

It depends on your terrain. Map out on graph paper the sun exposure with the interference from surrounding things like mountains. As the sun rises through the day it describes an arc through the sky. Different arc on the up coming summer solstice vs the winter solstice. There are books and web sites with tables of the sun arcs for various lat/long locations which saves you spending all year mapping the curve. See:

http://www.solarplots.info

Generally the rule is within 20° of south with a favoring of west rather than east. In our case we're faced a bit to the east of south because we have more mountain shadow to the west. This means we get more sunlight in the morning and it gets cut off in the PM. Ironically, the optimal angle ended up dead on to magnetic north-south. Just a coincidence.

I considered cutting down the mountain to get more sunlight but my kids said they liked it where it was...

Here's our tiny cottage which gets all it's heat from passive solar, a very small amount of wood burning and appliances/people. Small and efficient.

http://sugarmtnfarm.com/blog/2007/02...age-views.html

The photo is from before finishing. I need to do a new post.

Cheers,

-Walter
Sugar Mountain Farm
in the mountains of Vermont
http://SugarMtnFarm.com/blog/
http://HollyGraphicArt.com/
http://NoNAIS.org

[highlands]

Here's another good plotter:

http://www.sunposition.info/sunposit...ocations.php#1

[ericjeeper]

Heating the house during the day with the sun.. But now you have to figure out how you are going to keep the heat in at night and on cloudy days..
Going to need some sort of insulation somewhere in the window unit.. Be it an insulated drape. Myself I prefer to gain a little from the sun and keep my other manufactured heat in with good insulated windows..

[fantasymaker]

I think you might be missing something.
Windows are for veiws they have to be toward a veiw to see it.
Collectors are for heat they have to be south to collect it.
THEY DONT HAVE TO BE THE SAME THING!