orientation

The Adjust Room Orientation button produces a form containing a 'Compass Rose'. Buttons at bottom left and bottom right of the Compass Rose allow 'rotation' of the room to match it to geographic North or any orientation to within 22.5º of geographic North. Sufficiently accurate for all practical purposes of solar radiation heat gain if combined with a reasonable level of accuracy when drawing the room in the first place. For speed, the Compass Rose may be clicked upon directly at the desired point in order for 'snap to' orientation to be entered.

Room orientation is displayed by rotating a 'North Point' icon rather than the room drawing itself. However a facility is provided by clicking on the 'Wall Gain Review' icon on the top menu bar and then on to view the room in its rotated orientation with North at the top of the screen. The option is also provided to print the room(s) drawing either with North at the top or 'as drawn'.

For users of the 'COLDWIND' (coldroom refrigeration loads) version of the program, room orientation may not be a critically important value and the orientation routine thus ignored without significantly detracting from the accuracy of the result. Coldrooms and freezer rooms are almost inevitably self contained, insulated structures built within part of (usually) another, larger building. Solar gains through the material structure of the enveloping building rarely transmit as far as the coldroom insulation material. However, air temperatures between the enveloping structure and the coldroom insulation, especially where the gap between them is relatively small, may be significantly increased as a result of solar gains. The user does though have the choice of using either the solar gain routines (orientation) or of identifying and manually changing localised air temperatures external to coldroom insulation surfaces.