Conservatory Roof Blinds. Any way to cut costs?

Errata

I saw these in the Sunday Times http://www.shadeplus.co.uk/Freeform/Product/tabid/89/Default.aspx

Anthea~turner

Thankyou for all the replies. Those sail board blinds look interesting.
I am going to look into making my own blinds, to see if i can save on costs.
£1300 on blinds is too much for me, but i can see that it is worth it to those who can afford to pay that much.
I hope to be able to use some of your ideas, which have been a great help to me. Thanks Anthea.

Volcano

theblindman wrote: »

blinds do work, as long as you get the right ones, you need the correct backing, either energy saver, or ESP,

You sell blinds! Heck, you're not likely to admit they don't work!

The sunlight that penetrates glass and clear plastic heats up objects in the interior which then release infra-red radiation. This has a longer wavelength than sunlight so cannot escape the same way it came in, rapidly heating the interior. This is why closed cars heat up so quickly to such high temperatures on a sunny day:

http://www.school-for-champions.com/science/heating_greenhouse.htm

http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=0OmoWtBUJ3AC&pg=PA97&lpg=PA97&dq=%22greenhouse%22+glass+wavelength+changes&source=bl&ots=31tW_j5ORD&sig=KysCHix4Dr8WVRNw2mU1LXZtc_U&hl=en&ei=UI4uSs5R3pmMB8-NuZwL&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=8

Fitting blinds inside is akin to shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted!

The customer was more than happy to pay £1300 for these blinds, especially as i demonstated by getting them to stand in the conservatory with no blinds then drew them whilst they stood there, instantly cooler.

Of course! All that sunlight that was heating up their head is suddenly heating up the blinds instead! The sun continues to enter the conservatory, heating up the blinds and the air until eventually it's just as hot as it was before the blinds were fitted.

It's going to take a brave person to admit that they've just wasted £1300 though........

squibbs25

My nan has the polycool fitted in her conservatory and it does work. Def keeps the temp down in there as i found out the other day while i was there (i was very skeptical when she first bought the product) but it does do what is says!

theblindman

As i work in the blind industry, I do have a little understanding about the fabrics that i use, The manufacturers of the fabrics have done thier calculations about how the fabrics perform, and they do work.
The calculations are based on transmittance, absorbtion and reflectance, if you are interested I could post the figures, but who's interested really!
If you have the choice dont buy a conservatory, get a garden room, blinds arent particulaly aesthetic on the roof, but why is it that i sold more today to someone who had a couple of panels done and now wants the rest done because of the HEAT!
If you read my post, you would note that i said you have to choose the right fabric, and its never going to totally eliminate the heat gain, but can relflect upto 95% of the energy before it has chance to radiate from other objects!

theblindman

Anthea~turner wrote: »

Thankyou for all the replies. Those sail board blinds look interesting.
I am going to look into making my own blinds, to see if i can save on costs.
£1300 on blinds is too much for me, but i can see that it is worth it to those who can afford to pay that much.
I hope to be able to use some of your ideas, which have been a great help to me. Thanks Anthea.

If you want an easy way to put something on the roof, use some fabric and sew a pocket top and bottom to make a channel that you can pass a length of copper pipe or similar through. The screw some pipe clips to the top and bottom of the conservatory panel and clip the fabric in with the pipe clips.

Volcano

squibbs25 wrote: »

My nan has the polycool fitted in her conservatory and it does work. Def keeps the temp down in there as i found out the other day while i was there

It's not clear from their website exactly how this works, but something caught my eye on their FAQ page: http://www.polycool.co.uk/conservatory-cooling-questions.php

How does Polycool compare to roof blinds? Polycool is less expensive, maintenance free, and clean. Blinds will not stop the heat build-up

Their bold, not mine.

emmell

A relative of mine puts up a parasol inside his conservatory and sits under it with the doors and windows open. He first saw it in a very posh house on the coast and thought, if it's good enough for them then it had to be good enough for him.
ML.

Andy_ArT_Trigg

emmell wrote: »

A relative of mine puts up a parasol inside his conservatory and sits under it with the doors and windows open. He first saw it in a very posh house on the coast and thought, if it's good enough for them then it had to be good enough for him.
ML.

Sounds crazy but I just tried it and it's definitely a workaround - at least a temporary one. I was just quoted £5000 to fit roof blinds onto an orangery which cost £21,000 to complete. That's almost a quarter again of the total cost for digging out footings, building walls, installing all frames & glass, a glass roof, plastering and doors, windows plus electrics and all finishing.

These roof blinds are a complete rip off if they think they can justify £5000 for 12 large pieces of glass and 4 small corner ones. That's £312 per piece of glass.

rincage

Did you go for the sale shades in the end? Thinking of ordering myself but can't find much on them on the internet.

Thanks
James