Took this technique I learned in prison to make it bearable during the heatwave:
- Wet the window with a sponge or rag.
- Put aluminium foil up against it. Shiny side out. Cut beforehand on angled windows like that or use the roll on vertical surfaces.
- To cover the overlap, just wet the foil already on there, but be careful not to pull it off at the edge. An overlapping strip will stick to the other ones.
- Use masking tape to cover any overlapping edges that come away, as well as the edges that have a hard time connecting to the windowsill.
This keeps out an incredible amount of heat; you can feel how hot the foil itself gets during the day, while keeping the inside nice and cool.
The sun is putting out roughly 1kW/m^2, so for every square meter of your roof you cover, you’re keeping out 1kW of heat (obviously not strict math here). You can decide if you are more concerned about looking crazy or suffering in heat. Emergency blankets, space blankets, mylar(they’re actually polyester) blankets, are cheap.
https://www.ecofoil.com/collections/bubble-foil-insulation
Just one brand, there are more than this, but basically… NASA invented fancy-pants aluminum bubble foil, literally to protect astronauts and equipment from 100% unadulterated sunshine.
https://spinoff.nasa.gov/node/9314
It is stupidly cheap for how well it works.
They basically open sourced the patent, but, the industry that makes insulation stuffing for your attic is extremely not fond of this stuff, as… you basically only need 10% of their product, if you line the inside of your attic with radiantbarrier.
I got like a 10’ x 4’ sheet of it, put it between the two panes of my south facing window. Definitely works, makes the AC’s job significantly easier.
If you look into building codes in North America, you’ll find out that they were almost all decided by industry board rooms with no public engagement. You don’t need a conspiracy to make every cheap and sturdy form of construction illegal, when the people that wrote the regulations were literally owners of Portland Concrete, several timber companies, and several “insulation” companies. You don’t need a conspiracy when a group of rich people just acted in their own self interests.
We should be able to build adobe style homes that require almost nothing in the way of sellable construction materials, along with attached root cellars, and ice cellars. That would bring the cost of the average home down to $10,000-20,000, while eliminating the need for HVAC systems, as well as a refrigerator and freezer. Both of which have to use energy to function less well for food than engineering technologies that are hundreds of years old. A fridge can’t keep an apple or orange at peak freshness for 6 months. A properly packed root cellar can, even in summer months. A freezer will create freezer burn eventually. A proper ice cellar won’t, even during the dead of winter.
I basically agree with what you’re saying here, yeah, basically a bunch of totally unquailified PTA-like organizations are actually responsible for a surprising amount of norms and standards in the US, which are treated as if they are very smart and good rules, made by very smart and good people.
I think the stylistic quibble here is… what you in your example call ‘not a conspiracy’, I call ‘a conspiracy’.
A conspiracy doesn’t need to be secret or well hidden or non obvious, non mundane.
A conspiracy is literally just when a bunch of people decide to do something, and then do things toward that goal.
https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/conspiracy
Conspiracy is an agreement between two or more people to commit an illegal act, along with an intent to achieve the agreement’s goal. Most U.S. jurisdictions also require an overt act toward furthering the agreement.
But, we as a culture have a rather hysterical relationship with the word conspiracy, because it is so often used by people promoting … basically either extremely racist, or convoluted/incoherent, or sci-fi nonsense level plots.
But but, taking the very literal and basic concept of what the word means… and just replacing ‘illegal’ with ‘immoral’ or ‘devious’ or somesuch… people conspire very often and frequently, and its usually extremely straightforward with little to no significant attempt to ‘hide’ the conspiracy at all.
Old farmer’s trick. If you’re out and about and need to cool off fast, pour some water on your left forearm. Keeps your clothes dry (which is important) and you get a lot of bloodflow to your arms so the water there makes a more effective radiator. Left arm because it’s closer to the heart, I’m told works better. If you have plenty of water to spare, wet both forearms.
Fuck me, that’s such a good solution.
My flat has all windows facing west-southwest, and I live on the top floor under the roof. I’ve had 30 degrees inside when it’s been 24 outside today. Tomorrow’s going to go up to 29. I’m going to boil in here.
The downside is obviously you get zero natural light. And your neighbors might think you’re weird, but they’re roasting while you’re not so fuck em.
You could probably tape the foil to a piece of cardboard cut to size and that would make it easy to remove once the sun isn’t shining straight at your window and put it back before morning. I don’t know if the cardboard would affect it, however.
I’d use a piece of insulation foam board, cut to fit the window. Lighter than something like plywood, way more insulating, and can be easily squished into place once it is cut to size. Just hole the board up to the window, mark where your cuts need to be made, line one side with shiny foil, tape it along the back, and you’re done. Now you have an insulating reflective panel that can easily be popped in during the daytime heat, then pulled out at night.
You might also try a “swamp cooler” to cool down with:
Grab a bucket and a fan, and pour ice water into the bucket. Put the fan on behind the bucket and sit in the cool breeze it makes. It’s like having your own little a/c unit.
The one downside to this is that the evaporating water will eventually make the air humid and make it harder for your sweat to cool you down, but it works great in the short term.
Swamp coolers unfortunately only work in arid places. Where I live, it is often too humid for a swamp cooler to effectively cool anything.
I use this product on all the windows in the summer and winter. It insulates a bit and also reflects back.
The one thing better than inside is to have something on the outside, but that’s not possible for me, because it gets really windy here.
I got 3 inch foam board from lowes and cut it fit my west facing windows.
I didn’t know lowes sold that sort of thing! ;)
Upside down Lowe’s does not.
But if you want some sweet slacks and dacks, they’ve got you covered… AT LOWES
What about West Texas Lowes?
Bro I gotta ask… You don’t live in Sweden by any chance?
If they lived in Sweden they’d have AC in prison.
I do not. Wish I did; I like Sweden.
It’s not that great for what it’s worth.
Agreed, but you do have cheap bacon and beer. Which makes up for a lot.
Why do you say it’s not that great?
Like, I get why people say statesia is a bit terrifying, but I love my town. Been working on making it a better place (successfully, we have the best park in the California according to this one park dude I know) (okay it’s me I’m the this one park dude I know but I am really proud of our parks)
There’s also massive heatwaves in the Netherlands and Germany, there might be more that I don’t know about
e: in France, Italy and Britain also. Not in eastern Europe yet, at least not where I am currently
And, if you actually do this, you can poke a small hole in the foil and create a camera obscura!
I had Venetian blinds in the windows growing up and every morning at just the right time the light would hit the string holes and make cameras obscura. So it faced eastish.
Another heatwave life protip, put damp towels in the freezer and then sleep under them instead of a blanket. Use more than one so you can rotate out. Rolling them up will maximize freezer space, but I’ve also just wadded them in there as well.
I do a reverse hot water bottle, just pop a half-filled hot water bottle (or just any plastic bottle) in the freezer, it’s delightful to hold or use as a pillow.
there is UV absorbant window foil that you stick to the outside of your window and it heats up the inside a couple degrees less
I got “one way” reflective film for the window that gets the most sun exposure and it definitely makes a difference, ones provides privacy during the day while still letting me see outside
If it won’t stick. Mix cornstarch and water to make a water soluble glue.
And where do I get cornstarch in prison eh? Eh?
…
Oh yeah. I’m not in prison.
Probably the kinda thing we could figure out with stuff from commisary.
I mean, we made alcohol with pizza dough so I’d put my trust in the system.
If the foil gets warm, it’s heating up the space like a small radiator, right?
Yes but by reflecting >95% of the light, it does not get nearly as warm as what the light would otherwise shine on (typically gets dispersed all over the room, very little gets back out the window). Also, if placed outside a multi-layer window (which you should or the window may overheat and crack), the heat exchange to the inside via convection/conduction is stopped, only radiation remains, and the 80°C foil radiates way less than the 6000°C sun (also, shiny things are bad at receiving and transmitting black body radiation).
I don’t think it has enough mass to do much. Outside would be better, but it’s probably reflecting more than it’s absorbing and reradiating
Just get a roller shutter. I have a similar roof window and mine was like €40 with some DIY, which was years ago and has saved me tons of headache
Roller Shutter: €40 (at some point in the past)
Tin foil: €2 for a 10m roll.
I have one on another window but it’s dark blue and turns out that heats the space up even more so I did this as a short term solution.
Also the other comment was kinda right; it was the only way to keep the sun out in prison, although I’m out now.
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Aren’t we all just imprisoned in the capitalist heatdeath of society?
Did you miss the past tense in OP’s explanation?
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I’ve heard a similar thing with plastic cling wrap. Tape it to the window frame with double-sided tape and use a hairdryer to further seal it to get that double pane window effect.
Or get the plastic wrap kit at home depot to avoid all that measuring and fusing them together
Very effective for cold climate/weather, not so mach for heat.
I did this for the windows on an old 1920’s cabin in BC, the walls and roof cavity had been retrofitted with insulation, leaving the windows as the big heat loss spot during winter. Didn’t fix how cold it go inside during winter completely, but it did bring the unheated temp up a degree or two, which made heating and keeping a temp easier.
Summer, OTOH, it created a heat pocket that radiated more heat inside, so I did a covering for outside with light coloured heavy fabric (curtain fabric) for the outside.
That is for winter? Not summer
I am not sure how plastic wrap is going to stop UV
