"A [1974] test on conventional window shades showed... 1) A roller shade inside a with 1/4" gaps at the sides of the shade reduced heat loss through a single glazed window by about 28%. 2) A drape drawn in front of the... window reduced heat loss by about 6%. 3) A venetian blind reduced heat loss by 7%.During the summer the shading devices reduced heat gain by the following... 1) white, opaque roller shade 50% 2) venetian blinds (slats at 45%) 18% 3) venetian blinds (slats closed) 29%"
Steve Baer was an American solar energy inventor and pioneer of passive solar technology. Originally, as a largely self-taught designer and builder, he worked on small projects in Colorado and New Mexico; in time he and Zomeworks, the company he founded, achieved international recognition.
"I have applied for a patent on this structural system. The patent is assigned to Zomeworks Corporation. The predecessors of this system are the octet truss and the MERO space grid system. The relative potentials of these systems are discussed briefly by a comparison of their geometric possibilities."
Steve Baer"The forms possible using this system are limitless; there is no attempt here to explore these possibilities—the examples shown are small probings. The booklet describes the mathematics of the process that creates these limitless forms."
Steve Baer"Zomes can cluster together like soap bubbles. Their zones can be stretched, shrunk, or omitted completely to make the various zomes different shapes and sizes. The zomes can also pack several layers deep."
Steve Baer"The , because of its shape and the arrangement of its structural members is extremely strong, but its uses are limited because of the inflexibility of its shape. It is always part of a sphere... any variation would destroy the structural properties... It is complicated in structure and simple in shape. Zomes are simple in structure and complicated in shape."
Steve Baer"The regular polyhedra are like seeds from which growths may appear. They are the connecting joints for the zonohedra."
Steve Baer"This booklet had first an elementary explanation of the geometry of Zonohedra, then a more difficult account of the growths of the thirty-one zone star. This system, based on the 31 lines that pass through the center of an and either a vertex, edge midpoint of face midpoint is new and unusual."
Steve Baer