How to Design Solar on Architectural Building Plans

Consumers are becoming more and more energy-savvy, and some aren’t even waiting until their house is built to design a solar system that will satisfy their needs.

Some Pylon users almost exclusively install solar on new house builds, and they find that, even though we update our high resolution imagery about once every month, this still isn’t recent enough for them to design a solar system with accuracy.

That’s why we allow you to upload your own imagery in PDF, JPG or PNG format so that you can design solar systems on architectural blueprints without needing to wait for the house to be built or for airplanes to fly overhead and capture hi-res aerial imagery.

If your blueprints include the location of trees and shrubbery, you can even create 3D shading projections by placing 3D objects on the plans in their specified locations and adjusting their heights to generate accurate shadows.

How to Design Solar on Blueprints

Enter your site location

First, you will need to type in the address of the site location. It’s useful to keep your projects sorted by address, but Pylon also requires your lat / long so it can determine daylight hours and the angle of the sun.

Upload your blueprint

At the bottom of the screen you will see a button to Upload Custom Imagery.

Click here - Pylon will accept files in PDF, PNG and JPG formats.

Measure a known length

Next, measure a known length on the blueprint to put your design in scale. When you place panels on the roof, the available surface area will be determined by the length you set.

To help you be precise, press and hold the ruler point and Pylon will magnify the end location so you can drop it right where it needs to go.

Set the direction of North

Set the direction of North on your architectural plan. Pylon will use this to determine the position of the sun at all times.

Add gables to the roof

Select the shading tool on the left and drag and drop a gable onto the roof. Resize it to fit the blueprint. It should match your plans perfectly.

Add panels and nearby trees

Drag and drop panels onto the roof.

Use the shade estimator to drag trees onto the plan in their specified locations. You can adjust their height and width to match the blueprint. Pylon will then produce an accurate shading prediction on a house that hasn’t even been built yet!

Continue to system configuration

From here, you can add inverters and string your panels together, add battery storage, create a load profile, and calculate financial projections.

You can find out more about Pylon’s features here.

Send the proposal and convert the sale

Send your solar quote when it’s ready, and don’t forget to add eSignatures so your customer can sign it right away. Activate your Payment Gateway too so your customer can make their deposit from the proposal and lock in the contract.

Happy designing 😀