Next is a round house approach with translucent dome/ attic greenhouse on top. A solar chimney is heated by translucent dome, (which also serves as green house or as work room). Chimney has small platform near top which is hollow to impart more heat to boost draft. (The platform might serve well for very private sauna- sun bathing as well). The draft pulls air through the entire system. It pulls air up through living space and through floor. (Separate air paths through heat exchanger principle is suggested to shorten the ventilation path). Chimney draws directly from thermal storage bottom. Thermal storage air has previously been drawn down from translucent dome. Therefore dome can drive heat down to thermal storage mass. Thermal storage mass is also dome shaped to--
- More fully insulate heated thermal mass from ground below.
- Enclose more mass volume with less insulation material.
Numbers show passage of air entering into the attic greenhouse and then being drawn throughout heat storage. The solar chimney powers the entire air convection system through air tubes due to hotter air high within the solar chimney.
Diagrams above suggest that solar chimney needs enough draft to operate the whole system. Thermally activated valves open and close valves when temperatures heat up. Thermal engineers are invited to test this model premise and results will be posted here.
Greenhouse chimney
More standardized umbrella is pictured above, but with a simpler solar chimney, and greenhouse. The last picture below considers using a rounder dome umbrella which would have a ferrocement exterior shell. Corduroy heat collector built into exterior shell is thermally valved for natural control. Solar heated corduroy tubes then create a more classical thermal siphon to contribute heat to the earth tube storage behind the living space.
The collector tubes are portrayed in purple to indicate solar heating, since the ferrocement tubes are intended to be exposed to sunlight. The earth tubes located in the back are near to insulation umbrella to simplify the construction. It is proposed that a large excavator shape the dome of solid soil. The large excavator should work from center at ceiling level. (More plan ideas are available).
Bold new art form, building on PAHS, "Breathing Crystal" a new buildable shape for roof top green house, solar attic, or translucent room! All in the interest of inspired living possibilities. The promise of a self comforting house, should start with the wind fall discoveries of free heating and cooling design for temperate climates, (especially cold climates). There are growing networks of skilled people who can actually build all sorts of marvelous structures, despite the agonies and ecstasies of true creativity!
My optimized arc geometry for buried berm construction, lives here.
Comments, pro or con are invited, or typos? (Please indicate if you wish to be quoted or not ;).
Picture depicts sculpted, hollow rock structure to look natural and collect solar heat for extending the PAHS collection. (Link is planned to expand into boulder like sheds and also discuss issues like garden amelioration, pest control by cats, weasels, etc..)
For my latest "green roof" concepts, click here.The original PAHS house paid for by a government grant!
Branched U-Tube Thermal Distributor (designing an earth-tube installation for a semi-buried home.)
See my nephew's research and discussion page on PAHS and PAHS precursors.
Joe Anderson, PE, through his Prime Design Engineering, has done some interesting thermal modeling for self heating houses. (I think Joe coined the term "self heating house"). Joe found that earth tubes can be minimal and even omitted for much of the USA. I interpret that one can almost remove floor insulation in a super insulated house to achieve self heating, self powered radiant flooring? Through some emails and perhaps unknowingly, Joe helped jog me to invent the square donut design.
Here is a Virginia man who achieves self heating without earth tubes, but does depend on an electrical heat exchanger. Avoiding the use of electricity and for cold-wet climates, is one area I would love to explore as detailed above on this page.
Another North Westerner who has designed and built AGS homes reports on his work, but offers few picture-diagrams on the web.
Historical perspectives on PAHS / AGS
Too little is known about actual test comparisons between traditional reinforcement, flat spiral loops and individual "O" rings. Rings appear to have interesting test possibilities. As a low budget single handed developer, I have very little opportunity to test the many ideas presented in these www pages. The testing cannot keep up with my my conceptual exploration.
Note: These pages are placed in the public domain and are furnished "as is". The author assumes no responsibility for the use or misuse of the concepts in this series. All authorities should be satisfied first, as might be required, by relevant laws, before any building proceeds.
via http://harmoniouspalette.com/PAHSgreenhouse.html
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