Reflective heat shield for house windows

cepheus

In summer the Sun shines straight through my West facing windows in the Afternoon and early Evening converting the house into a sweatsheap. It is particularily bad in the upstairs spare room were I work on the computer, the quietest room in the house.

I have already fixed curtains with refective linings in this room, and whitish curtains or blinds in the other windows, but these are still rather ineffective. Perhaps something on the outside may work better?

Rather than buy something expensive which proves ineffective, I was wondering if some cheap car windscreen refective shields may work, just for the upstairs? Could these be attached on the outside with some suckers?

An alternative may be some close fitting internal blinds but these would have to cover the glazing part only since there is a window handle sticks out half mile preventing the use of close fitting blinds over the frame part!

OK_Sauce

Keep your windows closed. It may go against the grain but generally if it's warmer outside than inside you want to keep that warm air out! I also use heavy blackout linings on my south-west facing windows and they seem quite effective.

Suzy_M

Greenhouse Shading Paint!
Used this last year on just the garage windows as a trial. It worked a treat - as well as blocking a lot of heat it also reduced the glare and I'll be doing this to the south facing house windows this year.
Have tried blinds and screens on the outside of the window but there were problems with winds catching them and drying them out after rain.
Apply paint to outside surfaces of windows (but avoid getting any on plastic or rubber). It's white so unobtrusive and it lasted all summer including some cracking summer downpours and is easily removed as per the instructions.

Only drawback is you might want to clean a small area of to use as a peephole!

Suzy_M

And ditto what OK Sauce said.

cepheus

They are some less extreme films you can use, but I think these let in 20% of the Sunlight, but you can see out OK.

http://www.visionwindowfilms.co.uk/Reflective-Silver-15-Window-Film.aspx

Rather nervous about doing anything as applying paint or this to brand new windows.

The root of the problem may the the adjoining wall on next door's house. If that room get's too hot then so will mine. The bedroom which is not attached to that house seems a lot cooler despite the windows being oriented towards the Sun in the same way.

Suzy_M

cepheus wrote: »

T
Rather nervous about doing anything as applying paint or this to brand new windows.

It's not 'paint' as such. It's a powder you mix with water, paint it on the glass and when dry it forms a powdery coating which is rain resistant. You don't clean it off with water but with a dry cloth (old rough towel works very well).

But do keep it off plastic and rubber.