CurtPalme.com Home Theater Forum

garyfritz · Joined: 08 Apr 2006 Posts: 12088 Location: Fort Collins, CO

Well, in Mark's defense he does a lot more than cut down his movie watching. He's got an electric bike for commuting and has mentioned quite a few other footprint-reducing things he does. But he should stick to showing a good example, instead of going nonlinear on anybody who doesn't do what he does. He turns off more people than he converts.

ecrabb · Posted: Wed Sep 10, 2008 4:38 pm Post subject:

Exactly. Now, enough about the ideologue, please. Let's get back to more interesting things: Arnold's awesome theater and house.

I would also love to read/see more about the whole house and its sustainable design features. I would LOVE to have the resources to do more with sustainability and I'm fascinated by good design. The best I could do when we built our home was 2x6 construction, Icynene insulation, deep soffits with low-E glazing, some passive solar features, and high-efficiency furnace and A/C. I wanted to do HRV, but we ran out of time and money.

I have a good friend that's a commercial architect and very involved with sustainable design - we've kind of gotten hooked on this stuff together. He's a doing a large LEED-certified commercial office building in downtown Des Moines right now.

That reminds me. Here's a funny story about my architect friend and me that you guys might enjoy. It relates to sustainability, home theater, and general geekiness... OK, so my friend was presenting at a sustainable design conference in Boston before the AIA convention this summer, and the topic of the session was "smart buildings". Much of the commercial architecture community is relatively in the dark about automation and net-centric applications, so he was using some examples from residential architecture. As an illustration and entertainment moment, right from his spot on stage, he brought me up in iChat on-screen at the conference in front of the large audience of architects (Steve Jobs keynote style). I greeted the conference and carried my computer with me into my then-dark HT and sat down. He said, "We can't see you too well, Steve!", so I asked him to turn the lights on for me. Wink

He brought the browser window forward on the projection screen and turned my HT lights on for me - from Boston - much to the audience's delight. He then asked me a few questions about my system, we said goodbye and he turned my lights off for me - from his iPhone. The demonstration went off without a hitch and was very well-received - lots of applause! Very few people have any idea you can do real net-centric automation and building information on an average Joe's budget.

I'm also pretty excited about this... I've been talking to a company right here in little old Iowa that's coming to market with a PV solar product that integrates with EPDM rubber membrane roofing - which I just happen to have on my house! I'm hoping they'll work with me on the price and use me as a case study or marketing fodder or I likely won't be able to afford it - even with the small grants and loans that are available.

http://www.powerfilmsolar.com/products/building_integrated/membrane-roofing.html

Arnold, have the architects written up any sort of exec summary on your system? Your post for Mark's benefit was great, but I find myself wanting more and more information... While still fully aware and respecting the fact that this IS your private residence after all.

SC

perisoft · Joined: 29 Aug 2007 Posts: 2920 Location: Ithaca, NY

We were thinking about putting in a heat exchanger to handle the various buildings on our site, since we have a big-ass field out back. It would probably be pretty cost-effective long-term, but the up front is a bit tough given we'd have to lay some odd thousand feet of pipe ten feet down... It'd be awesome to do, though. One little electric pump, and all the heat you want for free... Very Happy

garyfritz · Joined: 08 Apr 2006 Posts: 12088 Location: Fort Collins, CO

Yeah, I really wanted to do geothermal, but it doesn't work too well for a retrofit in a small area. We'd have to drill vertical holes and it gets real expensive. Payoff would be something like 30+ years at current prices. Hard to justify. But if you have room for a flat pipe field, and especially if you're using propane (much more expensive than "city gas"), geothermal is great stuff.

greg_mitch · Joined: 03 May 2006 Posts: 5320

ecrabb · Posted: Thu Sep 11, 2008 12:55 am Post subject:

achase · Posted: Thu Sep 11, 2008 3:09 am Post subject:

achase · Posted: Thu Sep 11, 2008 3:14 am Post subject:

achase · Posted: Thu Sep 11, 2008 3:44 am Post subject:

Gino · Posted: Thu Sep 11, 2008 3:47 am Post subject:

Well done Arnold!

achase · Posted: Thu Sep 11, 2008 4:13 am Post subject: Final Post of the night...

Sorry to have taken so long to get updated photos to you. I'll try to keep up going forward since the theater construction is now finally underway. ALL of the theater is underground, with the lowest levels at 32' below a (planted) ground level. Only the lobby itself is under the house.