February 8^th Home Visit – McKinnon House.

Following the pattern set on previous years, the first get together for the Melbourne branch was a visit to a sustainable house.  This one was the rammed earth house in McKinnnon of Tim and Hamer.

Their house is designed on passive solar principles with some active systems.

Passive solar features include northern solar orientation, double glazing to most windows, significant amounts of materials that have high thermal mass including an exposed concrete slab and rammed earth walls, and high levels of roof insulation.

Active systems include a grid connect PV system, a solar HWS, compact fluros from day one and major appliances that were state of the art for energy use 8 years ago.

After a guided tour  the 21 attendees took advantage of the good weather and continued talking about all sorts of things over a BBQ.

A fabulous day and great hospitality from Tim and his lovely wife .  Many thanks

click here to see a slideshow of attendees at the house

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 28th, 2009 at 6:48 pm and is filed under Branch News, Melbourne. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.