There are tons of articles about orienting your house for solar and wind direction. Those reasons are valid, but most building sites are not set up perfectly for those issues and they disregard another factor of prime importance, the view. If you live in the mountains there is an excellent chance that you have purchased your land for a fabulous view of a mountain, a lake, a beautiful stand of trees or a meadow with wild flowers and wild life. Orienting and designing your house often requires a series of adjustments to achieve a sensible balance of important, but sometimes competing considerations.
Passive solar heat gain is a very good thing in winter, not so good in summer. Large, south facing windows allow light and warming sunlight to enter the house in winter. These same windows will also allow hot sunlight to enter in the summer unless roof overhangs of the proper depth or some other shading device prevent this unwanted heat source. To maximize solar heat gain in the winter, it is best to have the long axis of the house run east-west. If practical, avoid large, west facing windows as controlling heat gain, in any season, is almost impossible. North facing windows should be kept small and to a minimum. Of course, if that is where you have a wonderful view, disregard what I just said and try for that balance thing.
Aspen trees, as we all know, lose their leaves in the winter. This fact allows sunlight into our homes in the winter and vice versa, provide much needed shade, in the summer. Also they are not nearly as flammable as evergreens and therefore can be located much closer to the house without the same fire danger.
Roofs, more than any other design element, give the house its sense of shelter and character. They not only keep the elements out, they shed those same elements, sometimes in undesired places like driveways, entrances and decks. How the roofs will shed snow cannot be an after thought. It must be considered in the early design phases. Funny thing about snow, when you apply sunlight or heat to it, it melts and then can turn to ice. In theory, if we build a "cold roof", a roof with a cold air ventilation space so that any warm air rising through the ceiling will not warm the underside of the roof and melt the snow on the surface, we will not get ice dams along the roof eaves. But we also have sunlight in the mountains and this factor partially negates the positive effects of the cold roof. It is my experience that we cannot eliminate ice dams but we can limit the quantity and severity of them by building well constructed cold roofs and simplifying the number of places where snow collects, mainly roof valleys. So if you need or want dormers for your roof, consider shed style dormers instead of gables. They do not trap as much snow, afford a good opportunity to change roofing material or slope, and are also less expensive to build. Incidentally, heat tape, which I have used, is not a really good solution to ice dams. It simply indicates a poorly designed roof.
Grilling out used to be a means of cooking reserved for warm weather. Now, we grill outside all year long. So when designing that roof, consider an extra deep overhang next to the kitchen for cooking during the winter. No one wants to slog through the snow to stand at the grill. Also, our summer time sun can be quite intense. So if you do not have shade trees, consider a partial covering over the deck to give some relief to that summer sun.In a perfect world, all garages and their driveways would face south and get ample sunshine so that we never had to clear away snow. In real life, we have to work with what we have. I do try to orient the garage door to the south or west to take advantage of the afternoon sun to melt away snow and ice. In my opinion ทาวน์เฮ้าส์มือสอง กรุงเทพ the worst sun orientation is east. It gets just enough sun to melt some snow and ice but then that same ice refreezes in the afternoon when it is in the shade. Be aware that if your drive slopes toward the garage, you will need to provide a French drain across the front. Ideally, when you plow the drive, you will have ample room along the edge for snow storage. It is also a great thing if you can plow past the front of the garage instead of back dragging the snow away from it. Snow blowing the driveway gives a lot more freedom to how you can clear and store the snow. By the way, snow melt systems, while sometimes the only viable solution, are expensive to install and operate as they must be left on continuously so the concrete surface is warm enough to melt the snow as it falls.
Now, all that snow is going to mount up all winter long and then melt every spring. So first thing, place the floor levels high enough that they are out of the snow in the winter and high enough to provide good drainage away from the house when all that snow melts. Provide drainage swales around the house for the majority of snow melt from the site and snow storage from the drive. Do not allow snow melt from the site or the roof to run over paved areas as this water will freeze over night. Speaking of snow on the roof, keep in mind that it will come off either as melt or, solid snow, if you have a metal roof. The roofing material, combined with the slope of the roof, will determine if the snow will stay in place or come off and how quickly it will travel. This will also effect your decision about placing any landscaping at the base of the house.
One of the great things about living in the mountains is the summers. We have low humidity, warm days and cool nights. Take advantage of the cool nights by providing lots of natural ventilation. Design the house so that all rooms can get maximum air movement through them. Remember that cool air travels down hill and take advantage of nature's air-conditioner whenever possible.
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