Subject: Re: thermal mass?

From: "Willie Schmit, CRL" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 25 Mar 1997 07:56:24 -0800

Nick Pine wrote:
> 
> Don Minton <[email-masked]> wrote:
> 
> >The whole point of the solid tire walls is its THERMAL MASS, not insulation.
> 
> Seems to me ya gotta have both, the former inside the latter.
> 
> >Hope you save your 55 gallon drums ... because you will need 55 of them to
> >equal the 3000 gallon cistern... Imagine what a real consuer would need!
> 
> 10,000-20,000 gallons, where I live. A 4' deep x 8' wide x 80' long pond?
> A nice thermal mass inside a house or a greenhouse, if it could somehow be
> surrounded by insulation...
> 
> Nick

Wherever I have studied the numbers - more than enough sunlight exists to 
heat a house to the 40-60% contribution needed to consider it a "solar 
heated" house.  What most people dismiss is the MASS.  There is a common 
idea that only water can be used as thermal storage. Sure earth or 
concrete can only store 1/2 of the heat that water can, but you can't 
build a house out of water. 
Add insulation - add mass - reduce north, west, east facing glazing - and 
prevent the loss of that heat by reducing south facing glass to the 
required size (and no more)

---

From: [email-masked] (Gene A. Townsend)
Date: 26 Mar 1997 04:13:01 -0700

>build a house out of water. 

The eskimos having been building igloos for thousands of years, made
entirely of water.

I thought very seriously about building a house with water walls and
ceiling.  Since I live in southern Arizona, the igloo is out.

I built an experimental water wall, using corrugated steel a few years
ago that acted like a vertical water solar collector/storage tank,
that worked fairly well.  Four of these, and I have a water house.

Do you think I could get a reduced fire insurance rate for this
design?

Cheers,

Gene A. Townsend

---

From: Will Stewart <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 25 Mar 1997 19:51:21 -0500

> Seems to me ya gotta have both, the former inside the latter.

In an area with cold winters, this is true.  In areas, such as the
southwest US, that have warm days and cool evenings, the thermal mass
walls don't need insulation, because they simply 'flywheel' the
temperature swings.

Cheers,
-- 
William R. Stewart
http://www.patriot.net/users/wstewart/first.htm
Member American Solar Energy Society
Member Electrical Vehicle Association of America
"The truth will set you free:  - J.C.

---

From: [email-masked] (Nick Pine)
Date: 25 Mar 1997 13:30:16 -0500

Willie Schmit, CRL <[email-masked]> wrote:
 
>heated" house.

Some people call houses "solar heated" when they have no other form of heat.

>There is a common idea that only water can be used as thermal storage.

Water is good...

>required size (and no more)

And you may end up with a 50% solar heated house. To raise that fraction,
you can put as much south glazing as you like in a low-thermal-mass sunspace 
that gets cold at night, and put the thermal mass in a part of the house
that ideally has a temp of more than 70 F, on an average day. 

Nick