I wanted to add a skylight in my bath, but didn't want to do major reconstruction to reframe the ceiling through the attic space.  Someone told me about Solatube and I researched it and decided a tubular daylight device would work me. The Solatube tubular daylight device is a small bubble window that mounts into a small hole cut in to the roof.  A second hole is cut in to the ceiling of the room you're installing the unit in. A piece of reflective material is then installed in the attic area between the two holes - they do not need to be lined up as the reflective tube can be on an angle.  Because of that, there is no need for drywalling, reframing or other time consuming construction issues that one would expect when adding a window or skylight to a room. On a sunny day, we have lots of natural light flooding in to the shower area (which is where we had the light installed), allowing us to shower without electric lights on. We get several snow storms with substantial accumulation.  Because we placed this on a south facing location, the snow quickly melts and we get a lot of light in shortly after a storm.   We've not noticed any heat loss over the seasons, nor have we experienced any water leakage around the Solatube. The only issue we've had is in the heat of the summer, so much light is coming in, the bathroom is too warm.  To remedy that, I've bought a pastel colored shower cap that I fit over the "window" in the bath.

yesmar61

Madison, SD