One architect's approach to small efficient house

[poppy]

I was searching for 1940's house designs and ran across this blog.
http://blog.lamidesign.com/

This particular blog lays out a design process for a contest house; one that would end up in a plan book.

They were given two family profiles to start with and asked to design an energy efficient house that any builder (or self-builder) could use.

This architect is influenced by Swedish designs.

I am certainly not recommending this particular design.  As a matter of fact, I think it's ugly.   

And based on my limited knowledge of wind power, I don't know if their roof top wind turbines will work.  My wind turbine engineer neighbor had to mount his turbines away from the house for better efficiency.

There seems to be a number of new folks here who are designing new houses, so maybe there are some good ideas on this blog, or not.

[MushCreek]

That would win first prize in an Ugly contest, wouldn't it?

[Squirl]

 

[Freeholdfarm]

I agree that most of his designs would qualify as UGLY!!  There are some good ideas there, if you dig for them, but why do so many architects seem to think that they have to design UGLY houses in order to be accepted?!?

Kathleen

[Redoverfarm]

Not sure if anyone else noticed the wind turbines.  They are set to catch the wind from a predominating direction facing the slope of the roof.  What happens if the wind is coming from the opposite direction.  The rudder on the blades cannot turn through the housing(surround).  The complete housing would have to turn.  I know it is a concept but unless it takes this into consideration you would only be producing prower part of the time.

[poppy]

Good points John.  The architect kind of says that the turbines were an after-thought.  He clearly doesn't know much about wind generated power.

When I was visiting with my neighbor and saw a pole on the side of his house with nothing on it, I asked him why one of his wind turbines was not on the pole. He said his wind studies showed more consistent and stronger wind away from the house.

The presence of the house close to the turbine causes too much turbulence.

Even if the turbine housings could rotate, the turbulence would create too many problems, me thinks.  The architect was thinking out of his a--.

[bmafg]

Not just ugly, but ugly in a neighborhood full of ugly.

Jim

[diyfrank]

Good points John.  The architect kind of says that the turbines were an after-thought.  He clearly doesn't know much about wind generated power.

When I was visiting with my neighbor and saw a pole on the side of his house with nothing on it, I asked him why one of his wind turbines was not on the pole. He said his wind studies showed more consistent and stronger wind away from the house.

The presence of the house close to the turbine causes too much turbulence.

Even if the turbine housings could rotate, the turbulence would create too many problems, me thinks.  The architect was thinking out of his a--.

How about trees?
Would you need to clear a large area to prevent turbulence?  I assume You need to be well above the trees, but will it still dampen the currents too much?

Yes ugly houses.

[poppy]

Well Frank, you have exposed the upper levels of my knowledge on wind power, so I am now above my head. 

I haven't done a search, but there's probably some good info. in the Off-Grid discussions.

But based on my neighbor's experience and knowledge, one does indeed need to be above the trees.  My neighbor's spread is in a valley running west to east so he's able to take advantage of the prevailing westerly breezes, and all of his turbines are on 50' plus towers.

[MushCreek]

Things like houses and trees tend to spoil the wind flow. I've read that wind velocity doubles the first 40' off the ground. I noticed that around here during a hurricane, the wind was roaring like mad in the tree tops, yet there was very little at ground level.