Thermal Mass

As the walls are dressed or touched up and the roof is framed, it is time to recall why we chose an adobe home in the first place. On a day when the crew were working on dressing the inside walls and framing the roof at 4 pm the ambient temperature was 88° F (see inset).

Temperature on outside of wall.

Temperature on inside of wall.

The house currently has no windows or doors and no insulation in the ceiling.  After sitting in the sun all day I took the temperature of the outside of an adobe wall in direct sun light.  It was 115° F as you can see in the following image.

Directly on the inside of that wall, in the living room, the adobe wall measured just 75° F.  Remember there are no windows or doors and no insulation.  That is the magic of thermal mass.  The walls cool down over night (when the temperature dropped to 52° F) and then hold that coolness during the day.

Inside north wall.

Brick floors.

On a wall on the north side of the room, away from the sunny south wall, the adobe wall temperature is still lower, 67.8° F!  And the brick floors a comfortable 69° F.