Quote:
Originally Posted by S-F
...Their low end doors are a bargain at $6,000 although I've got my eye on the high end ones (5") for $12,000...
$12,000? Just get a regular Home Depot fiberglass door for $250 and use the extra $14,750 to heat you house for generations to come...
S-F,
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Quote:
Why is it that people who can afford to have a Ground Source Heat Pump system don't really need the low cost of operation, and people who really need the low cost of Ground Source Heat Pump operation can't afford to have one?
Regards,
-AC_Hacker
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I'm flattered that you included my quote, but I think that you might have mis-used it somewhat.
In the context in which the quote appeared, I intended the reader to take away the message that DIY... careful, smart DIY can trump technically advanced commercial offerings. Especially important when the commercial offerings yield substantial energy-reduction advantages... only not at a price that those who really need the advantages can afford. Thus the need for DIY.
I consciously tried to avoid trashing GSHPs in the Manifesto, because there is nothing wrong with how they work, or their reputation for reliability. They're great. But we can build them out of cast off parts.
I think the same is true for Passive House doors, too. I don't think you can argue that they are quite good. It's not just the R-value that is good, but also much care has gone into designing for superior sealing, double sealing. To cap it off, they do look great.
Most commercial doors such as the fiberglass ones from Big Box Inc are designed by a committee to offend no one. As a result, they don't really please anyone either.
Instead of trashing these hyper-expensive doors (I'd rather spend the money buying more insulation and also installing a DIY radiant floor... I could do all that for the price of one door, and have enough left over to make a door that was a very close match for the commercial Passive House door) we should start a thread on how to DIY an extremely good door that matches Passive House performance. The principles of their design should be emulated.
We can do this...
-AC