Comments on: Practical Solar Wants To Heat Your Home Like A Solar Oven http://www.ohgizmo.com/2009/03/23/practical-solar-wants-to-heat-your-home-like-a-solar-oven/ Deliciously Geeky... Sat, 21 Nov 2009 16:31:21 -0600 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.4 hourly 1 By: solar man http://www.ohgizmo.com/2009/03/23/practical-solar-wants-to-heat-your-home-like-a-solar-oven/comment-page-1/#comment-395314 solar man Sat, 28 Mar 2009 11:50:39 +0000 http://www.ohgizmo.com/?p=22219#comment-395314 I think I'll stick with my conventional solar panels I think I'll stick with my conventional solar panels

]]> By: Rachel http://www.ohgizmo.com/2009/03/23/practical-solar-wants-to-heat-your-home-like-a-solar-oven/comment-page-1/#comment-395192 Rachel Mon, 23 Mar 2009 21:07:10 +0000 http://www.ohgizmo.com/?p=22219#comment-395192 Hi Fronten,<br>I work for Practical Solar. I hope this helps, but feel free to email me at <a href="mailto:rachel@practicalsolar.com" rel="nofollow">rachel@practicalsolar.com</a> if you have any other questions. <br>1. Typically, we aim the sun spot high on the window so it clears the heads of the people inside, and then diffuses off of the ceiling (it helps if the ceiling is white). <br>2. Not sure what you mean here. The heliostats have a positioning accuracy of 0.1 degrees. <br>3. The only other heliostat manufacturer we know of lists its similarly sized heliostats at about 10X the price of ours ($10,000/heliostat). We are certainly working to bring our prices down even further, but for the time being, our customers feel they're getting a lot for their money. For example, there's no other product on the market that can make the north side of your home feel like the south side! <br>4. In terms of the distance the heliostat is away from the target (e.g. window), you can customize the size and shape of the reflected sun spot by using our mirror-focusing technique during installation. Essentially, you tilt the mirrors when you install them to either focus or defocus the sun spot as you like. It's a low tech procedure that allows you to install a heliostat say 200 feet away from the house, but still be able to fit the whole sun spot through a 3-foot diameter window (sunlight diverges 1 foot over every 100 feet, and the sun spot can't be smaller than the individual mirrors, which are 1-foot squares). <br><br>Thanks for your interest!<br>Rachel Hi Fronten,
I work for Practical Solar. I hope this helps, but feel free to email me at rachel@practicalsolar.com if you have any other questions.
1. Typically, we aim the sun spot high on the window so it clears the heads of the people inside, and then diffuses off of the ceiling (it helps if the ceiling is white).
2. Not sure what you mean here. The heliostats have a positioning accuracy of 0.1 degrees.
3. The only other heliostat manufacturer we know of lists its similarly sized heliostats at about 10X the price of ours ($10,000/heliostat). We are certainly working to bring our prices down even further, but for the time being, our customers feel they're getting a lot for their money. For example, there's no other product on the market that can make the north side of your home feel like the south side!
4. In terms of the distance the heliostat is away from the target (e.g. window), you can customize the size and shape of the reflected sun spot by using our mirror-focusing technique during installation. Essentially, you tilt the mirrors when you install them to either focus or defocus the sun spot as you like. It's a low tech procedure that allows you to install a heliostat say 200 feet away from the house, but still be able to fit the whole sun spot through a 3-foot diameter window (sunlight diverges 1 foot over every 100 feet, and the sun spot can't be smaller than the individual mirrors, which are 1-foot squares).

Thanks for your interest!
Rachel

]]> By: fronten http://www.ohgizmo.com/2009/03/23/practical-solar-wants-to-heat-your-home-like-a-solar-oven/comment-page-1/#comment-395184 fronten Mon, 23 Mar 2009 12:42:36 +0000 http://www.ohgizmo.com/?p=22219#comment-395184 best way? <br>but so many drawbacks..<br>* you cannot look out of the window anymore<br>* to small output to make solar tracking feasable<br>* costs, costs and costs again<br>* distance dependant, just say focus<br><br>may be good if you also have another indoor sun-light-distribution system installed (to get more true sunlight to your rooms) best way?
but so many drawbacks..
* you cannot look out of the window anymore
* to small output to make solar tracking feasable
* costs, costs and costs again
* distance dependant, just say focus

may be good if you also have another indoor sun-light-distribution system installed (to get more true sunlight to your rooms)

]]> By: powerball http://www.ohgizmo.com/2009/03/23/practical-solar-wants-to-heat-your-home-like-a-solar-oven/comment-page-1/#comment-395180 powerball Mon, 23 Mar 2009 10:24:17 +0000 http://www.ohgizmo.com/?p=22219#comment-395180 Best way to heat your house with solar energy by heliostat system.Well done Practical Solar! Best way to heat your house with solar energy by heliostat system.Well done Practical Solar!

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