Awning shadow study - need help, please.

[Tomko]

Colleagues: I am planning an awning for my backyard. Attached to my house, it is intended to give shade to my patio.

I have a fixed width and length. But I am trying to determine the appropriate height. Just low enough to cast the desired shadow. Thereby preserving as much light as possible coming into the house’s windows.

I’ve searched Google for a functional solution but come up empty.

Does anyone have any experience in calculating shadow?

Thank you.

 

[bad_idea]

Trial and/or error. There are a lot of variables that will factor in. I recommend hanging a shade sail (tarp if you don't want to pay the money for a proper sail). Attach it to the house at the desired height. Sink a couple posts in the yard and play around with the mounting point on the posts. Once you get the desired height sorted, build something permanent.

Keep in mind time of year and time of day will play a part in it. For instance, I have a shade sail on the back of my garage. It is great mid day, and almost useless at 6 PM in the summer. The back face of the garage faces northwest. The sail is mounted 10' up the side of the garage and 8' up to two posts. I think this summer I will play around with the mounting height to make it more useful at the dinner hour.

 

[Justind97]

There's a program called Realtime Landscaping.

I use it for my business. One of the cool features is that it you import the overhead view from google maps to create the 3D modeling. With that, the program is smart enough to throw shadows as the day progresses.

This would be your quickest solution. You can manipulate the size of the awning in about 30 seconds

You could find someone local or pay someone a few dollars to design your house and include the awning.

 

[scofo]

"Sustainable by design " susdesign.com is a site I found on the "build it solar" site. They have all kinds of solar design tools including the one for your overhang question.
Good luck.

Sketchup used to have a solar feature, it may still but it was bought out years back and I've not been able to use it since then.

 

[californiamilleghia]

I have a couple trees that drop all the leaves in the winter when the sun is low , which helps with the winter solar , but when its full of leaves hurts the summer sun for solar but keeps the house cool,

So think about the trees !