glass roof and throwing stones

With the dreariness of winter setting in I start to get wild ideas about making the house sunnier. Has anybody considered or implemented a glass roof on part of the house? I don't mean just a skylight, I mean replacing the entire roof of our sun room to truly make it "sunny." I have seen conservatory rooms in the catalogs with glass roofs and want to know why, money aside, we couldn't do it to a normal room. Your thoughts, comments, and pictures are appreciated. Happy holidays to all.

I so wish I had a room that I could glass in for a conservatory or four season room! When we add on to this house, I'd love to do that.

My doctor, when I was younger, did have a glass wall on the rear of his house. Unfortunately he also lived on like the 9th hole of a golf course. You don't need details do ya? LOL

Seriously, I think I would have an architect look at it or have one of those sunroom companies come look at it to give you an opinion or estimate. Then you could go from there, informed. Good luck!

my whole gh is glass

here is a front view

I think they mean to rip off part of the roof on their actual house and replace it with glass. ;)

We were considering opening the ceiling in our sunroom or the attic, but I thought it might heat up the whole house a bit too much in Summer. So we had Florian built us a "Geneva" type greenhouse on top of the garage, attached to the house and we walk right into it through an upstairs room.
http://www.florian-greenhouse.com/

Notmartha, that's gorgeous, looks like a painting.

RUK, that is a great idea if only the garage weren't under our kitchen! The Florian site is full of ideas and I highly recommend it to others. I already requested the brochure. What type of glass did you use for your greenhouse?

escubed,
http://www.florian-greenhouse.com/GLASS.HTML

We chose the double glass "better" at the time, given the choices we went with the medium grade available.

Having the greenhouse attached to the house has another benefit. Although the house and the greenhouse have separate thermostats, the air circulates through both. On sunny winter days the greenhouse warms up past the set temp of 70 F during the day and so also warms the rest of the house, which we nowadays rarely have to SET above 65.

You may want to investigate polycarbonate, aka Lexan to use instead of glass. Has similar light transmissivity, but is very, very break-resistant. :)

I am thinking about adding on a disassemble-able lean-to style greenhouse/room to the back of my house, for winter use only, to enclose a brick patio. I'm thinking about using lexan/polycarbonate for the roof panels, and 20 mil pvc sheeting for the wall panels. I have two existing walls, so I would be looking at enclosing a space that measures roughly 132 square feet.

-Joe

A glass roof like a conservatory in the house would be nice, but in the summer time you'd better have a way to shutter it effectively because the heat will either run you out of the house or run you broke trying to cool it.

For the northern areas of the country this sort of passive solar heating has a lot to recommend it. Growing your plants while helping to warm the house is just gravy.

......Alan.

Thanks for the warning. I had already considered some sort of shades for the summer and in case I ever wanted to watch TV in the daytime. I guess they add to the expense of the project.

http://www.charleysgreenhouse.com/index.cfm?page=_productdetails&productid=2126&cid1=204&cid2=814&cid3=-99

this is an excellent reflective which I place inside the greenhouse about a foot below the ceiling in Summer. The fan pulls out the hot air from between this foil and ceiling.)
But, I must say, at this point I do not use my greenhouse during the Summer, since I place all my plants into a special outside growing area. I still do install the reflective cloth to keep the greenhouse cool. It works!

RUK, It seems like an interesting product, and it probably works as you say, but I think it would be inappropriate for the place in which it would be used, my sunroom. My wife, who is tolerating this flight of fancy so far, would probably like something more frilly or interiorish (is that a word?).

escubed,
you just have to tell her to add a tassle or two??
Joke aside, it doesn't look bad at all. DH helped me by placing a few skinny rods between the glass ceiling panels to hold the fabric in place and I used some clamps to tie them up. It is functional, I admit, but it is neat. And comfortable!!