"Rick" wrote in message
news
On Mon, 10 Oct 2005 23:22:10 +0100, Matt
aka Lord Hall wrote from Makita mansion:

"Dave Plowman (News)" through a haze of senile
flatulence wrote: In article ,
Matt aka Lord Hall wrote:
Best to have the insulation on the outside of the walls so the
thermal
mass is usable.

Drivel, just for the record on this occasion I actually agree with
you.

I'd not bother asking Drivel since he never gives a sensible reply, but
just why would you want a high thermal mass house?

If you rely on low grade but highly variable heat sources it is
useful. For instance in a house with high solar gain it can moderate
the extremely high room temperatures that might otherwise be attained
with a low thermal mass house while "banking" the useful heat for
later use. Adding active shutters or blinds to the windows and/or
throttling venting of the interior then caps the heat input but the
internal mass will maintain the temperature within a reasonable range
for many hours.

You will probably need a top up from a conventional heat source but
typically this would be much later in the day or even overnight, less
important in the UK perhaps but in some other areas of the world
moving your peak demand either for heating or cooling can be very
useful.

I have a programmable
thermostat which is set to give different temperatures throughout the
day
and night. With high thermal mass this would be difficult.

It is, but assuming the same insulation levels a high thermal mass
house will usually be designed for using solar gain (or passive
cooling) to a much greater extent than conventional properties and so
overall it's usually cheaper to run.

Lord Hall, high thermal mass homes are not usually designed for using solar
gain (or passive cooling) at all.

Using only conventional heat
sources with no time of use incentives and having high thermal mass on
the inside makes little sense.

To me, a well
insulated interior would be the ideal
you could quickly change the temp.

Richard Cranium is totally wrong again.

You can't. One of the first examples I saw was back in the mid 70's
when Granada TV did a series "House For The Future" where they took a
derelict barn near Macclesfield and rebuilt it as a low energy
property. A fascinating experiment as a reaction to the oil crisis
and way ahead of its time with many interesting technologies being
demonstrated. But I remember throwing up my hands in horror as they
added a foot of insulation on the outside and then clad it in high
maintenance timber,

Lord Hall, some timber is maintenance free.

Rick, you don't get anything for nothing. Thermal mass absorbs heat and then
gives it back off slowly. So, the heat you purchased goes to heat the
thermal mass. If a house is designed for passive solar, the sun can heat
the thermal mass. Or active solar with panels and this can heat the floors
(UFH).