Coping with heat

Summer is helllll.

Previously houses in NL had traditional double glazing. The glass kept heat out in summer and cold out in winter

Now this has been replaced by hr++ glazing. That keeps heat inside, ok in winter but in summer it is like a sauna.

My dream would be to oversummer in a cooler climate.

I use a spray bottle to spray my clothes or face. A cold towel in the neck. Cold foot baths.

Mostly I hope the summer is over soon haha.

My fan on the lowest setting is pretty quiet.

I also freeze some water bottles and use them in front of the fan or without fan just put them near me, when they melt, they release their cool.

Edit; I prefer to not to have to use the fan, since it still creates noise.

I wish there was a cooling system without noise though. I will try to look for a human doggypad like @jnmaciuch It seems low budget and quiet, ideal.
 
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Chestnut tree said:
Summer is helllll.

Previously houses in NL had traditional double glazing. The glass kept heat out in summer and cold out in winter

Now this has been replaced by hr++ glazing. That keeps heat inside, ok in winter but in summer it is like a sauna.

My dream would be to oversummer in a cooler climate.

I use a spray bottle to spray my clothes or face. A cold towel in the neck. Cold foot baths.

Mostly I hope the summer is over soon haha.

My fan on the lowest setting is pretty quiet.

I also freeze some water bottles and use them in front of the fan or without fan just put them near me, when they melt, they release their cool.
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I might try the bottles idea, I get paranoid about mold. I'm not originally from the UK and never had mold growing up. I know it's summer but I don't really get out of the mindset from winter of preventing mold.
 
PrairieLights said:
Heat is one of those things that leaves me struggling more. I have no access to air conditioning.

I thought maybe if there are others who also struggle we could share some tips or ideas that help us.

Last year I bought these window heat reflecting things for the window. I have them in my bedroom. They do reduce the temperature a bit in my room.

https://amzn.eu/d/avhjlAa
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Thanks, they look good. My slight concern is that I know with the types of reflective, tinted film that can be applied directly to windows, the glass needs to be toughened glass as otherwise the increased heat gain can cause the glass to crack, and apparently this is still a risk with reflective panels of the sort shown in the Amazon link. However, I’m very tempted to try them.
 
hinterland said:
Thanks, they look good. My slight concern is that I know with the types of reflective, tinted film that can be applied directly to windows, the glass needs to be toughened glass as otherwise the increased heat gain can cause the glass to crack, and apparently this is still a risk with reflective panels of the sort shown in the Amazon link. However, I’m very tempted to try them.
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I didn't know about that. This is my second year putting them up. We have double glazing.
 
As Braganca said, if you want to block heat from coming in through windows, you need to place the block on the outside of the glass. My cabin has lots of south-facing windows, so I hang white tarps on the outside. No view, and it's dark inside, but it prevents my cabin from becoming an oven. Maybe I'll hang those tarps today.

Chestnut tree said:
I also freeze some water bottles and use them in front of the fan or without fan just put them near me, when they melt, they release their cool.
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Where does the heat go when you freeze that water? If your fridge/freezer in inside your home, you're just putting that heat into that room, plus additional heat due to inefficiency of the freezer.
 
PrairieLights said:
I'm not originally from the UK and never had mold growing up.
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I've never lived anywhere else, but nor have I.

When house are well heated, rooms can be ventilated, and there's no water ingress from leaking gutters, damaged flashing, trapped rainwater, or badly-done alterations, mould doesn't tend to be much of a problem. Not even if like me, you air-dry all your laundry indoors.
 
Creekside said:
Maybe I'll hang those tarps today.
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I did hang them. Darkness has fallen indoors. However, given the sunny day, I'm guessing that I've prevented quite a few degrees of temperature rise in my cabin. Solar ovens are fine for food, but not for living in.

Now it's time to start opening windows in the evening and closing them in the morning.

If the heat does start to really bother me, I can upgrade my solar power system and install a small heat pump. Not dependable for winter heating, due to short daylight hours and cold air, but the cooling would be nice in summer.
 
Poor thermal regulation is a problem.

Get an old thick jacket, denim is good. Soak it in water, squeeze it out so it is not dripping too much. Put it on and sit near a fan or breeze. Works well for keeping core temp down, especially if you don't move about much.

I removed the sleeves from mine as it helps keep the dripping away from the desk/computer/etc.

Doesn't work as well in high humidity, but still works. Also need to wash it frequently, though if you put it on over a t-shirt that reduces how frequently it needs washing. Wet the t-shirt too and that reduces how often you have to re-wet the whole arrangment.

Thick towels or sheets will also do the job at a pinch, just not quite as convenient as a jacket.

Main thing to aim for is keeping the torso cool, as that works best for controlling core temp.
 
hinterland said:
Thanks, they look good. My slight concern is that I know with the types of reflective, tinted film that can be applied directly to windows, the glass needs to be toughened glass as otherwise the increased heat gain can cause the glass to crack, and apparently this is still a risk with reflective panels of the sort shown in the Amazon link. However, I’m very tempted to try them.
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Yes make sure that you have old style double glazing! Hr++ glazing can suffer from heatshock and crack.

I did see some specials hr++ foils.

I did the tin foil on old style double glazing and it really works. I did put it inside, since I can’t put it on the outside.
 
Creekside said:
As Braganca said, if you want to block heat from coming in through windows, you need to place the block on the outside of the glass. My cabin has lots of south-facing windows, so I hang white tarps on the outside. No view, and it's dark inside, but it prevents my cabin from becoming an oven. Maybe I'll hang those tarps today.


Where does the heat go when you freeze that water? If your fridge/freezer in inside your home, you're just putting that heat into that room, plus additional heat due to inefficiency of the freezer.
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My freezer does not exude any heat luckily. I would recommend to use cold water in the bottle and to not fully fill them, because ice expands.
 
Chestnut tree said:
My freezer does not exude any heat luckily.
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Are the condenser coils outside? Typical freezers these days have the condenser coils bonded to the outer case of the appliance, so the heat is spread out, so it might not feel much warmer than room temperature, but it's still hundreds of watts of heat added to the room.

A refrigeration system is just a heat pump: it pumps thermal energy from one surface at one temperature to another, with additional heat added due to inefficiency. Ideally, fridges and freezers would have external condenser coils to pump heat out of the house, switchable to an internal coil when outdoor temperatures drop below desired level. If appliances (with coils on the unit) were standardized, rooms meant for them could have a pair of vents that could circulate outside air past the coils. I wonder how much energy that fairly cheap and simple change would save worldwide.

Yesterday was my first truly hot day of the year (26C). I'm very glad that I put up the sunblocker.

Solar insolation is about 1 kw/m^2. So, an unshaded window letting sunlight in is like having a 1 kw heater running full blast in that room. Since glass absorbs some of that energy, and even aluminum foil (shiny side) might only be 80+% reflective, putting foil on the inside might still add a few hundred watts of heat to the room. Of course, some windows are just too difficult to access for an outside sunshield.
 
Creekside said:
it might not feel much warmer than room temperature
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But wouldn't that mean it doesn't matter? Feeling overheated is about perception, not temperature. My little hand-held fan does nothing to cool the room but it makes a big difference to my comfort.

I couldn't feel any temperature difference at all behind my fridge/freezer, so for the heck of it I measured it with an ecology thermometer.

At the warmest part of the day, the space behind the freezer was 0.32º C warmer than the coolest part of the room. It was also 2.16º C cooler than the end of the room where the (shaded) window is.

The problem seems to be that people put windows in houses, not that they put freezers in them. ;)
 
Kitty said:
But wouldn't that mean it doesn't matter? Feeling overheated is about perception, not temperature. My little hand-held fan does nothing to cool the room but it makes a big difference to my comfort.
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This is the thing that fascinates me about this. I used to live in Singapore. 25-35 and very high dew point all the time. The country depends upon air con but didn’t live in it, I acclimatised. I spent time in places without it. I used to do long hikes, run even (not in the middle of the day) and be dripping with sweat. But fine.

Now I don’t so much feel hot, or even sweat, but when the temp is above 23 my body breaks. So it’s like you say nit the temperature or perhaps even the perception but something even underlying that. I notice feeling ‘weird’ before I notice feeling hot.
 
Kitty said:
But wouldn't that mean it doesn't matter?
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Thermal energy is thermal energy. If you put 300 watts of heat into a room, it's going to be warmer than if you didn't. It all adds up. Running my PC (60+ watts) for a few hours raises my room's temperature noticeably more than running my Raspberry Pi (20 W). I find that even half a degree makes a difference in comfort level.

Windows can make a bigger difference than low-power computers, so even using white curtains inside might let you avoid a degree or more of temperature rise.
 
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