“Hi Owen, I love your blog and am so impressed with all the work you do. Thank-you.
It crossed my mind that drying clothes is difficulty not often covered. Sure there are commercial dryers with various levels of efficiency and power sources. But they are expensive to buy and to use over time. And the dryer wears out your clothes, changing them slowly into lint. A clothes line works in good weather but is useless in bad.
My suggestion is a drying closet built with a soda can solar heater outside, connecting directly to the closet. Computer fans can keep the air circulating even when no heat is coming from the solar heater. It’s amazing how much faster things dry with a little air movement.
The closet could have a rod to hang clothes and fold up/down mesh shelves for sweaters or other things that shouldn’t or can’t be hung up. When not needed as a dryer the door could be opened allowing the heat into the dwelling. At night the door could be closed to keep the warm air from leaving the house.
It could even be built as a free standing hut if there is no room in the house.
I hope you like my idea.”
Warmest regards, Leslie
http://www.builditsolar.com/Projects/SpaceHeating/Space_Heating.htm They have a page called ‘Solar Dryers’ but that for food dehydration. You could probably upscale their dehydrator designs and use them for clothes, but I think it would get a bit hotter than you really want for this application. You could just hang clothes in a greenhouse if you have one, but it might be a bit too humid.
That sounds like a really nice idea.Do you have pictures you could send? I’d love to see what 1 looks like.
No pictures or drawings. It’s just an idea she sent me.
We live in the rainforest of Costa Rica. Dry Houses are common here. Getting ready to build one for us using bamboo and clear plastic for the roof. Just like a greenhouse.