Idea Scenery:NASA Tech House

[Graham2001]

Back in the late 1970's (Following the Energy Crisis) NASA built and tested an energy/water saving home design they hoped would become the home design of the future. Rather sadly it did not.

I thought it might make for an interesting piece of scenery and provide homes for out of work UMMUs.

Floorplan & Artists Impression



See:

Lessons Of The NASA Tech House

Alternate NASA Tech House Design

Further research on the NTRS has turned up several more documents relating to this project. Probably the most useful of these is a contractors report containing a design different from the one actually used (See the document linked above). This could be used to provide variety if the buildings are used to define an area of housing.

Floorplan & Artists Impression



See:

NASA Project Tech: Technology Utilization House Study Report

 

[Graham2001]

Other 70's House designs on the NTRS

I've located two further late 70's housing designs on the NTRS, which could be perfect for use as scenery, I'm currently looking through the documents on the second (Which have been poorly scanned) to see if I can find good copies of the floor plan & artists impression. However the document concerning the first was well scanned, so here it is.

Home Building Plan Service (Oregon), Solar House

The house design pictured below was offered to residents of the State of Oregon and was designed to be compatible with various solar heating units being worked on at the time.

Floor Plan & Artists Impression



See:

Home Building Plan Service (Oregon), Solar House Schematic

 

[Graham2001]

Other 70's House designs on the NTRS (Continued)

Here is the other late 70's Solar House design I located yesterday. Looking at a third house design, but the plans are really poorly scanned and I'm trying to marry them all together at this time.

Decade 80 Solar House

Commercial design, tested with NASAs assitance.

Floor Plan & Artists Impression



See:

Design Package For Instrumentation Of The Decade 80 House In Tucson, Arizona

 

[Graham2001]

Here are some additional documents related to the NASA Tech House I posted about in the OP.

1. The NASA House: A house constructed and furnished with aerospace technology

2. NASA Tech House: An early evaluation

3. The House that NASA Built

4. NASA Tech House

5. An evaluation of the NASA Tech House, including live-in test results, volume 1

6. NASA Technology Utilization House technical support package. Summary of results and house description

 

[Graham2001]

Other 70's House designs on the NTRS (Continued)

Here are two more 70's era Solar House designs which appear to be alternate designs for the NASA Tech House.

Design 1



Design 2



See:

Space & Energy Conservation Housing Prototype Unit Development

 

[CStapleton]

Decade 80 Solar House, Tucson, AZ

I've recently come into possession of a Canadian house plan book from 1976 with a cover story that includes a bit of information about the Decade 80 solar house in Tucson. The article is principally about a solar house being built as the prize home for the Pacific National Exhibition held in Vancouver every year, but includes some photos and drawings of the Decade 80 house. Unfortunately, no actual photos of the PNE house are in the article.

You can find a scan of the front cover of the book, with a photo of the back yard pool area here:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/12329819@N06/9641354764/

The next four images that you can access from that page are scans of the article in the book.

It also seems as though National Geographic may have done an article on the house:

http://www.natgeocreative.com/photography/818615

My curiosity has been piqued by this article, so I've been trying to find out more about the house online. Nothing I've found so far has any information on where in Tucson the house is located. You wouldn't by chance know, would you?

The most recent information I've been able to locate is a newspaper article written in 1995, that indicates the house's solar system is no longer in use. Here is a snippet from that article:

Time has played a dirty trick on the Copper House, a former high-tech ``home of the future.''

Built 20 years ago as a showcase for copper, the Decade 80 Solar House was a technological wonder, a home designed to run by the sun.

Solar power would supply 100 percent of the home's heating, 75 percent of its cooling and even operate the lock on its 10-foot-high copper front door.
None of that works now.

The underground thermal storage tank, the heart of the solar system, rusted out and burst about eight years ago and was never replaced.

And the photovoltaic-powered front-door lock has been replaced with a standard dead-bolt.


It seems the people who had purchased the home originally had purchased it for its looks, and the views it would afford them, and I quote "didn't care a whit about its technology". They had put it up for sale at the time of the article's writing for less than a half million dollars.

It's sad really, that what must have been quite groundbreaking technology had been allowed to go to ruin, and be replaced by more conventional ways of heating and cooling.

Makes me wonder whether the house is still standing. If so, considering the price of copper these days, I wonder if much of the copper it employed has been removed and sold for scrap. It had copper installed on interior walls for decoration, the copper fireplace in the living room, and the solar panels were copper.

 

[Graham2001]

Thanks for the additional information. CStapleton. As a note, it looks like some of the links in this thread have been restored after the security scare.

In the OP the link to "Lessons Of The NASA Tech House" is currently broken while the link to "NASA Project Tech: Technology Utilization House Study Report" is still pointing to the relevant report.

The "Home Building Plan Service (Oregon), Solar House Schematic" can still be viewed.

The other links will take more time to check out.

 

[Graham2001]

For the remaining posts in this thread.

Post 3: Link still points to document.

Post 4: Link 1 is currently broken. Links 2, 3, 4, 5 & 6 still point to the documents.

Post 5:Link still points to document.

 

[CStapleton]

I found this PDF file about the house recently:

http://www.iapmo.org/Official%20Articles/1975-03_CDA_Solar_House.pdf

And information gleaned from another newspaper article I found online helped me pinpoint the house on Google Maps. It's located on North Via Piccolina in the Tucson National Estates. Here is what it looks like from the satellite view.

The garage has been added on to, as well as the guest house, and a peak has been built over the front entrance, but that's it. I think they must have turned the original garage into a bedroom when they added the new garage, as it now has 4 bedrooms.

As you can see, the solar panels have been removed from the roof, as it is no longer heated and cooled by solar energy.

---------- Post added at 03:53 PM ---------- Previous post was at 05:05 AM ----------

Here are three more PDF files I found online. I think one of them is the same as what you've linked to above, but from a different source, and of slightly better picture quality.

http://www.osti.gov/scitech/servlets/purl/6790231

http://www.osti.gov/scitech/servlets/purl/6790221

http://www.osti.gov/scitech/servlets/purl/6417907

 

[nanfree612]

Hello to all ~~~ First time here, but was so surprised to see a photo of MY HOUSE, here...:thumbup:
I was doing a google search for a friend re: "Decade 80 Solar House" as she wanted to see more about it after visiting recently. I have a LOT of information about this house if you want to contact me. We bought it in 2009...we are the 4th owners. Original purchaser lived here 1975-1995, followed by 2nd purchaser 1995-2005, 3rd purchaser 2005-2008, when their sad departure into bankruptcy put this house into foreclosure at which time we grabbed it......my partner and owner first showed me this house on our 1st date back in 2000 and said he had been wanting to own it since it had been built....dreams do actually come true !

This is our "Copper House" ...
contact me for more information...we bought this house in 2009 from its 3rd owner and yes, sadly, all the solar capabilities stopped working by 1985...we gutted the "equipment room" when we installed completely new HVAC systems...we added the 3 car garage...we stripped off the damaged original copper roof and sold it for recycle, recouping over 50% of the cost of the new roof...this house has an amazing story to tell...