Sunday, 7 August 2022

Solar Floor heating house (again) position summary

So to complete this for a while here is a summary position of the improvements. 

Below is the data from what the house was like before I did anything, the data comes from a point in winter when I was away from the house all during the week (so no heating, just ambient).


Dear American audience, please note: as you (speaking of the General Public, not NASA or Science in the USA) are the living museum of discarded standards and practices in science (well and other things) these temperatures are in Celsius not Farrenhuffenfurter ...

Actual picture of Mr Farrenhuffenfurter the developer of the Eff temperature scale in 1724

So, today we have this measurement (photo of the screen of the temperature station cos I'm too slack to pull the data and compile as above). I chose to use the times above to match the 7:30am 24 hour slot taken here.


RED is inside, BLUE is outside (temps also in C not F)

Discussion

Firstly, what's truly amazing about this is that the area of "pipe" I have outside would suggest I can only capture (at most and assuming 100% efficiency) 500W of energy.

Outside temperature range is about similar to the graph from 2019, however its worth mentioning that the minimum outside temperature today is a little above what it should be because I'm hanging the thermometer under a tree now. The actual outside temp this morning was -0.5C (with a frost). The inside temperature goes into the night warmer (being nicely heated by the solar floor system and its attendant insulation). 

I did use a bit of reverse cycle AC in the morning (evident from the step up in the curve) and a fire was use in the evening (again evident on the graph).

Insulation fitment in both the ceiling and the floor was critical to the success of this project and it has not only enabled the (quite meagre) energy available from the outside solar to be transferred successfully into the house.  Further the insulation has meant that any heating I do inside the insulation (where I live) is far more effective.

Outcome

My house is now much more comfortable and my heating costs (electricity and wood) are significantly down (approximately 25% of what they were). If you dont' give a shit about environmental issues you may give a shit about your finances ... so its either win or win win (depending on your value sets)

If you have landed here and are unaware of the history of this project you can find it at these links:

  1. Solar floor heating again
  2. part 2
  3. when the sun don't shine
Naturally as a perpetual tinkerer this will change and improve as I tidy up all the insulation sealing and and consider other Solar Heat Gathering methods.


... There are very few nations in the world that use this unit of temperature. The countries and territories that use the Fahrenheit scale are the United States, the Bahamas, the Cayman Islands, Liberia, Palau, the Federated States of Micronesia, and the Marshall Islands.

I think thats hilarious. I wonder ... can the USA ever modernise? 

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