SOLAR HEATING AND COOLING GUIDELINES FOR WINDOWS

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During the summer the sliding roof panels are kept closed during the hot days and are opened at night. This allows the water to act as a heat sink for the house during daylight hours and to radiate the warmth it collects into the sky after the sun has gone down.

The process is reversed in the winter. Then, the panels are opened during sunshiny days so that the black containers of water can absorb solar energy. When the insulating roof is then closed at night, the heat in the water radiates down through the ceiling in each room and warms the living space below.

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STEVE BAER'S ORIGINAL "DRUM WALL"

The construction and operation of Steve Baer's original "drum wall" solar heating/cooling system is very easy to understand. The whole setup—complete—contains no expensive valves, pumps, plumbing, exotic fluids, eutectic salts, specialized plastic membranes, or space age photovoltaic cells. Nothing but 55-gallon metal drums (available free-for-the-hauling in most parts of the country) stacked up behind a wall of glass windows (recycled are OK) that can be covered and uncovered by a hinge-down, insulated panel operated by a small hand winch.

To fine-tune the system, face the let-down panel with aluminum (so that it becomes a giant reflector). You can also paint the drums black on their out-ends (so they'll absorb solar energy better) and white on the ends that point into the house (to improve their radiation characteristics and their appearance). That's it.

In the winter, the insulated panel is cranked down on bright days to allow the sun to shine directly through the glass and warm the water in the drums. Additional heat is directed at the barrels at this time as the aluminized surface of the panel reflects much of the solar-fall it receives through the full-length window too.

During winter nights and on cloudy days, of course, the hinged panel is kept up. This prevents the warmth stored in the drums from radiating back out through the glass . . . and allows it to heat the living space behind the containers.

That's all very obvious. What's frequently forgotten, however, is that the above process can work just as well in reverse. The water in the barrels, if desired, can also be used to absorb excess heat from the house for eventual radiation out through the glass. This is accomplished in the summer merely by leaving the insulated panel up during long, hot days . . . and then cranking it down at night.

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