alternate materials

[anna.sappa]

Hi,

i'm an engineering student (from italy), i'm working with Ecotect for my degree thesis.

I've a problem with the alternate material:

i assign to walls a primary and an alternate material, but in "visualise", even if there are adjacent walls, it looks like the used material is the primary.

what can i do?

thank you

AS

[Pennetier1]

Hello anna.sappa, 

Unfortunately, there is no way, that I know of, to display the Alternate material instead of the Primary in the visualization window.

Ecotect is not really a rendering engine, so these visualization issues, although annoying at time, are not entirely relevant to the overall analysis processes.

For visualization purposes, you would have to change the primary material to look like your alternate material.

Sorry I could not help you on this matter.

Cheers,

[anna.sappa]

ok,

however we are sure that is just a rendering problem, and it use correctly the alternate material in the analysis?

three other questions:

- in the alternate material i have to define the complete section of the wall/floor/ceiling or just half ? ecotect add two adjacent alternate materials or use one of these?

- ecotect use just "simmetrical material"? in floor-celing between ground floor andi 1st floor i have a precast concrete slab with linoleum on the floor surface.I defined slab+linoleum for floor's alternate material and linoleum+slab for celing's alt material, i tried to change internal and external color bun in each combination in the visualise schedule i see both surfaces with the linoleum color. is it just a rendering problem?...but..which is the correct combination?

-i defined a schedule for the heating system, every room has the same schedule. i noted that for an hour after the "turn on" and "turn off" i have a relevant flow between internal zones. i can't understand why it appens.

i hope that my english is good enoght to explain these matters.

thanks a lot!

AS

[Pennetier1]

Hi anna.sappa, 

It is not really a rendering problem, as the function is just not implemented in the software, but yes, while you do not see the alternate material in the visualization window, whenever the object is adjacent to another object, they will bot use the alternate material for the thermal calculations.

1. Yes, you have to create the entire material, just like any other material.  Ecotect does not "split" in half the alternate material.  It simply sees that two objects are adjacent to one another, since there can only be one type of assembly at that area, Ecotect uses the Alternate assembly's properties for that adjacent surface area alone.  Obviously, the adjacent objects MUST have a similar Alternate material, otherwise, Ecotect will not know which one to use. You can also set Ecotect to do this automatically by going to the User Preferences menu (Crtl + Shift + P) > Fixing Links tab > Automatically Fix alternate material for adjacent surfaces.

2. Again, Ecotect will only use the Primary material for Visualization purposes.

3. You see a flow between the zones - you mean you can see the HVAC system still working?  Cooling or Heating even after the turn on/off time?  What is the colour of the line in your graph?  Did you use the simple Hours of Operation schedule or did you define your own schedule using the schedule editor? (I do not think you can use the schedule editor for the HVAC system, a bug I believe).  You should not see any HVAC working after the hour you have set in the Hour of Operations (the blue bar might be set to "off at 16" but that means that the HVAC will work through that hour, so off at 17.  It is best to use the On/Off input box on the right side of the sliders.

One last thought: if you go to the User Preferences menu (Crtl + Shift + P) > Options tab > is the "Use more Pro-active DBT-based heating and cooling algorithm" checked or unchecked?

I hope I can help you figure this all out.

Let me know if you have more questions on this topic, otherwise please accept as a solution so that others can benefit from this information.

Cheers,

[anna.sappa]

I'm sorry,

i can't solve my problems...i restarted with a simpler model, just the zone in the middle is defined as thermal:

my purpose is to study different type of solutions for glass elements for an energy improvement.

i defined the material as in the picture:

Ecotect says that i have no solar gain (orientation SW)....what's wrong?

thank you so much!

[Pennetier1]

Hello Anna, 

It looks like you have set your Alt Solar Gains to 0 in the glazing properties; that would indeed bring all Solar gains to nothing. The correct number to put in is difficult to get from your glass manufacturer, so I would simply use the default ones that Ecotect gives.  If your glass has a Low-e film, it will make a difference, with numbers in the 20's.

Also, your Refractive Index is set to 0.  The typical glass has a refractive index of 1.74.  That would change the solar gains very little, but still.

Let me know if you have more questions on this topic, otherwise please accept as a solution so that others can benefit from this information.

Cheers,