Sky Lights

[Eugene Dixon]

Thinking about summer time in SC and the six transparent panels in the s'hanger roof that let in radiant heat. I like the light, not the heat. The light panels are ~3'X10'.

Been thinking about some sort of exterior shade cloth and found this out there on the inter web: https://ezsnapdirect.com/help

Anyone have any experience with this kind of material?

TIA

[Mike Wilkins]

You could take a look at the window tint film used on automobiles. I did that treatment on an arched window mounted in the gable wall in my sunroom to block some of the late afternoon sun.
Auto parts stores have it.

[Brice Rogers]

I have two 2x4' skylights in my 24 x 36 workshop (located inland in southern Ca. where it runs 90-95 for a month and a few days hitting 110 plus. I have 10 foot ceilings. I don't really notice all that much of a temperature increase. My skylights are a type of plastic and are dual thickness which might help. If the temp increase was a concern, I could probably add another transparent barrier between the skylights and the interior.

Some skylights (plastic) have kind of a bubble. I think that putting a solar film (not a tint film because you want to keep out the Infrared) would be difficult with the plastic bubble skylights. Some skylights (glass) are dual pane thermopanes. I'd recommend the glass ones. And putting on a thermal reflecting film would be much easier.

I really like having the skylights...

[Lisa Starr]

Is your roof insulated where there are no light panels? If not, I'd suspect that the summer heat gain is from the roof in general, not the light panels. As the light panels are plastic and the roof is probably metal, you'd have lots of heat gain from the roof itself.

[Alan Lightstone]

I would think about the automotive window film tint. Some of the better ones $$$ really block out amazing amounts of UV light.

[Jim Becker]

The panels sound like they are not a low-e type product. So in addition to coating/films and shades, there is also the option to replace the panels with energy efficient units. But...$$$$$

[Tom M King]

The original part of our house started out as a passive solar house with a very large skylight on the South roof. That's been long since changed to a gable dormer, but when we had the skylight, I made louvers I put over them in warm weather, and they were taken off when leaves started falling. For Summer, Pam made a Sunbrella cover that we put over the louvers to keep any extraneous light out.

[Eugene Dixon]

Here's an old photo from move-in day. This might clarify some things.

Move-in.jpeg

[Wayne Cannon]

We have three large south- and west-facing windows, no shading, with exterior roll-up screen-cloth that block 95% of the sunlight. The screens make a very noticeable difference in summer heat gain. They have to be exterior to block heat. They advertise greater benefit than films. They offer 100% blockage, but these are our view Windows.

[Maurice Mcmurry]

I recently replaced our Wasco double dome plastic skylight with a low E double pane glass Velux. We no longer feel the heat on sunny days. Its nice in the summer. I suspect the small amount of winter heat the old Wasco used to make in the day was offset by loosing heat at night. It is a dilemma. A lot of thought went into the problem in the 1970's when folks were trying to solve passive solar. We helped on one house that had a system to blow foam beads into the south facing collector windows at night. What a mess! The summer heat solution was a roll up exterior shade made from greenhouse shade fabric.
We have a south & west facing triple corner window where the kitchen table sits. It is a hot corner on sunny days. I tried space blankets in between the storm windows one summer and fabric shades on the exterior the next summer. The fabric shades on the exterior work best.