so I shall depart for now. I have my house to side.

Will you be putting radiant on?

Skytherm sys? Yes I have seen it before. Yes it will work in some climates. In my opinion there are too many downsides to the idea.
1. Does not work in cold climates
2. Too much maintenance
3. Too many mechanical issues and systems to maintain
4. Too expensive, additional structural cost of building wading pool and cover on roof and supporting it.
5. Maintaining water quality, pool cleaning, while the goal of a system should be to make life as hassle free as possible, this does not.
6. Easier ways to accomplish the same benefits at lower costs with fewer hassles.


I will try to explain this one more time in as simple of terms as I can.
1. Thermal flow is made up of three components, conduction, convection, and radiation.
2. Framing in a 16 inch spacing wall is normally considered a 20% volume fraction of the wall.
3. Heat transfers through solids is by conduction.
4. Heat transfers through air is by radiation, conduction and convection.
5. Each Radiant barrier in the cavity reduces radiant energy in its 80% fraction by 90%.
6. Sheeting will stop 50% of radiant energy.
7. 3 radiant barriers and 2 sheeting layers will stop 99.9% of radiant energy in its 80% fraction.
8. 4 sealed air gaps will stop 97.5% of conduction and convection in its 80% fraction.
9. 4.5 inches of wood will stop 84% of the total energy transfer.
10. Total conduction and convection transfer is reduced by 1-(84% of 20%)-(97.5% of 80%) = 95%
11. Total radiation is reduced by 98%
This is about the same performance as a to code 2X6 wall with standard construction. It is also the same as a 2X4 wall filled with urethane foam. This shows that 60% of the remaining energy is conduction through the 2X4 and 40% is through the sheeting.

This illustrates that if you added 2 inches of iso foam, inch on each side of the 2X if the conductive path you would improve the performance of the wall by 50% for little cost. This approximation assumes a static situation, perfect sealing of all layers, no wind, and constant temperatures, which for comparison purposes is reasonable but is not real world unless you pay extreme attention to detailing. This also assumes permeability is not an issue in your area.

Adobe done properly will last in any environment. Anyone experienced with modified earth based materials can tell you this. There are many such homes in Washington and in British Columbia. Most adobe, rammed earth, homes are more labor intensive. These materials have to be modified for given climates. Again if you know what you are doing it is not a problem.

I have not had a difficult time with code officers on any of my alternative projects. I do work with them, and treat them with respect and provide all the engineering information, back ground and calculations they desire. I find that people that have problems with code individuals usually have an attitude problem or communicate the information in a non-professional manner. My experience is they are generally interested in learning about new and better ways of doing things. I have often taught classes to code officials about alternative methods and how to deal with them. The city and county officials are often interested in the notoriety such projects will bring to the community. If you get them on board it usually greases the skids.

Are builders interested? The question is how many builders are responsible, care about the earth, our future, and care enough to deliver the most responsible, eco-friendly, greenest, most sustainable, healthiest environment, utmost life improvements, financial benefits to their clients and do they want to be in business in 10 years.

If you do not take the time to learn your clients will move on given the information and knowledge.

Brian

Greetings,

QUOTE> Will you be putting radiant on?

Yes, 1/2" furring strips, layer perforated foil and then steel siding.

Since I have a sips house the improvement won't be as dramatic as when I use to side FG houses.
I've added a RB to the ceiling and installed new drywall. The ceiling feels cool to the touch on a 95 + deg day. My roof is unshaded.

Thanks for asking.

Greetings,

QUOTE>

Skytherm sys? Yes I have seen it before. Yes it will work in some climates. In my opinion there are too many downsides to the idea.
1. Does not work in cold climates
2. Too much maintenance
3. Too many mechanical issues and systems to maintain
4. Too expensive, additional structural cost of building wading pool and cover on roof and supporting it.
5. Maintaining water quality, pool cleaning, while the goal of a system should be to make life as hassle free as possible, this does not.
6. Easier ways to accomplish the same benefits at lower costs with fewer hassles

As far as climate goes Mr Hayes told me they built a two story home on an university campus. I believe in Wis although it could have been Minn. He said that they screwed it up and still it worked. The biggest problem of course is radiant cooling in the summer, northern climate. They used a passive sys for the 1st floor and modified roof pond for second. The home has since bin torn down for a campus building.

1. that's what it was designed for.
2 Not according to Mr Hayes
3 What maintenance? It's foam panels on tracks and a Fractional HP motor to move panels twice a day or nite. What syss. The water is in plastic bags.
4 Cost slightly more than conventional. Mr Hayes said that if mass produce it would cost no more than conventional. Used 8" water. You might want to do the load calc. The foam panels was the cover.
5 An auto sys moving the panels twice a day is about as hassle free as you can get. I imagine water bed chemicals each wear or two is not much trouble.

Mr Hayes got a grant from DOE to build the first one and DOEs engineers immediately started to him how the sys should be built. ( where have we heard that before.) The local utility company tried to get him to let them install FREE a back up HVAC sys three times. ( I wonder why?)

After the Cal building had been in use for awhile DOE contracted with GE to evaluate the performance. GE monitored the unit for at least a year and issued a 400+ page report stating that the sys performed as designed. DOE turned over the report to a Texas University( I forget which one) and they tried to devalue the performance, but couldn't.

The unit maintained a 74 deg constant with slight occasional variations. There was also occasional humidity problems (?) but were minor and short lived. Never any mold. Mr Hayes said the house could not burn down because of the water pond.

By accident he found out about the RB factor and said that applying a RB to the down facing foam surface increased the sys eff. 30%.

The last time I had contact with Mr Hayes he had contracted cancer and said he had lost interest in his creations. I never met him personally but enjoyed and learned much in our phone conversations.

He had at least one other major invention which the Gov managed to sabotage.

Between Mr Hayes experience with the gov and what I have learned from numerous engineers, inventors, plus my personal experiences over the years, we have to have the most corrupt society that ever existed.

It's a miracle people still try to invent improvement with the sys resistance they get.

I'll get to the rest of your post later. The muscles in my 73 yr old body aren't behaving properly with the exercise in siding.