I don't, but my neighbor has one. She LOVES it! I hate it! It does not leak, it was installed properly.....but it looks like a tunnel in her ceiling(at least 4' long).....like a habitrail!!! I expect to see little gerbils in it when I look up. :0) On the outside of the house it's a plastic bubble on her roof.....looks like an afterthought home owners project from the 60's!

Just my opinion.....

(note: she also installed 2 skylights in her livingroom, they also look like long tunnels. Her attic above the livingroom creates this effect. She needs vaulted ceilings to get "the look".

We have them in some bathrooms, one which is an interior room and the other which has only a small window. They are wonderful and I am so glad we did them. The quality of light is great (it's a pure, bright light but diffused so it evenly lights the whole room) and we've had no leaking or insulating issues (meaning no extra heat in the summer or cold in the winter -- they let nothing in and nothing out). (We also had them professionally installed, but it's my understanding they are also a pretty simple DIY. I'm scared of heights so they are not a DIY for me!)

Those rooms have flat, 8' ceilings and are on the second storey (with an attic overhead). I don't have a photo ready and I'll try to get one later today, but they are just flat with the ceiling and they look a bit like a huge recessed light. The light they provide is fantastic and even on an overcast day (such as we're having today) we don't need to turn on the lights.

Given the design (and height) of our eaves you have to really look for the little bubbles on the roof if you want to see them (actually, one of them is impossible to see from street level -- you'd have to get on the roof to find it, the other you can see but only if you stand in the middle of the street and know just where to look). I don't think the bubble looks strange at all given all the other stuff found on roofs (bubbles from skylights, vents, etc.), but everyone's tolerance is different. What's yours?

We'd do them again in a NY minute and wish there were a way to get them into our (interior) kitchen and the (also interior) powder room (both of which are on the main floor and so would be really hard to get from the roof through the attic, second storey, down to the main floor.

Yes, I have a Sola-Tube (believe that was the brand) in my vanity bath area. I love it. It was professionally installed 4 years ago and we have had no issues. The room is on the 2nd story of our home with a flat 8' ceiling. You can hardly see it on the roof outside. Before it was installed the room was pitch dark and you could not even walk through it without turning on the light. My son had a friend over the other day and they were in there and I could hear the 2nd grader asking "how do I turn off this light?". He did not want to leave the room without turning off the "light".

You can get one that also has a built in light so that at night it operates as a light. I used one in a design for a master bath over the shower.

Eileen, I love the tile design around the suntunnel in the shower.

The previous homeowners installed one in the windowless laundry room. It looks very much like the one above. You cant see the tube, it looks like a flush light fixture. I always think I left the light on in there.

Thanks terriks,

I tried to make the light look like a stylish sun.

We took out the only bathroom window and put one in. No leaks and we always think we left the light on. DH did the work himself. We love it!

Yes, they do we have 2 since we have an inside kit. no windows to outside, we opted for 2 sun tunnels,we at first went with the smaller one, then the larger one,would advise going with the bigger right away, the sz. does make a big difference..the one in the foreground here is the smaller of the two, and sun is not out, just took this, you can see how much light even with sun behind clouds.

I love mine. We have them all through the 2nd story, which is the main area of our house. There are only a few days a year that I need to turn a light on during the day. We get plenty of light from them even on cloudy days.

We also had electric lights put in several of them, for night-time use.

Ours are all Sola-Tube, which I think uses actual mirror to line the tubes. Some brands use foil which provides less light. The foil may be fine for simple straight runs, but not for long, angled runs.

I live in a single-story house and have one in my powder room. It was installed only 4 months ago but we have had some very heavy rain and it hasn't leaked. Here is a picture with no flash and no light on:

Thanks everyone for your input. Wow, they really do pull in a lot of light. One more question....I would have to have them professionally installed, and I wondered if anyone would be willing to tell me (ballpark) how much it cost to have them installed. And, what kind of installation person would one call...a general contractor? Thanks again. I really appreciate it.
Susan

Well I just think those are the neatest things since sliced bread! I have never heard of or seen one before. I have a thing about sunlight; I tend to get depressed in the winter months. You know I'm going to just have to get some of those!

I was just reading all about them on www.gotubular.com and they have some pricing information too. They seem to be about $500 or so depending on how far from the source the light is installed. They recommend installation by a certified shylight specialist but then they want the revenue from the installation so take it for what it's worth!

tpam - I used to get "winter blues" also, these are great! We had 7 installed, all electrified, during initial construction of the house. We have some in each size, I'm not sure of the split. The total cost was $5100, for materials and installation. This was 3 years ago, the cost may have come down since.

Here's the link to the Solatube site, which can direct you to local dealers.

Here is a link that might be useful: Solatube site

We had our two installed by the people who sold them -- a one-stop shop sort of thing. pam-md is spot on -- they cost $500 per (one should've cost a bit more because it required an extra foot of tubing but the installer liked my politics [he heard me listening to talk radio] so he didn't charge me for it). We had those installed pretty shortly after moving in; nearly a year later we started a massive remodel and the GC said they install them all the time as well but for significantly less (maybe half the cost). Live and learn!

my desire is to put on in our bathroom that has no windows and we have to keep a nightlight on in there all the time..even painted gold it is very dark..i would love to put one in, thinking of one with a fan as they do have those and i could replace our ceiling exhaust fan with one.

I had one installed in my bathroom that didn't have any outside windows in the last home and we loved it. The Solatube created so much light not just in the bathroom, but also in the hallway next to the bathroom. It never leaked during the 4 years that we lived there. My mom also has one and hers hasn't leaked in the last 10 years.

I had forgotten all about these. How is the light? Is it harsh like outdoor light can be or a more flattering light than that?

What a beautiful and luxurious space you created, Eileen. It looks perfect. I hope you can get back to that soon.

Thank tgd2008. That design was for a client that owned a string of funeral homes in WI. His mother owns a hearse business. I did the mother's bathroom also but just some simpler updates like new lighting, floor, faucets. The mother met her husband because she was a beautician that worked on the deceased to prepare them for his or her funeral. A bit of a strange family. The son was single and was probably a millionaire but his business probably put off some women, I would imagine. Thanks again.

This is what the funeral director's master bath used to look like:

Wow, interesting job and amazing transformation. Thanks for sharing that.

We have 2 of them and love them. A neighbor came and saw ours and immediately called the store and got some for herself. You will never regret doing it.

Thanks again for everyone's input. I'll be educating myself and finding out if anyone around here installs them. Really enjoyed seeing the pics, too. I'm amazed at how much difference they make. I have thought about selling this house because of how little light gets into the living room and den.

do any of you with them live with snow in winter? just wondering if we have a heavy snow fall whether the snow would just block the bubble...

i need to do some research to see if the tube goes straight up or turn... you know, now that there is google earth and all :)

Wow! This is great information. I've been considering a sun tube for an interior hallway in our house that is really dark. I have a question, though: Has anyone had the tube come down two stories, and how disruptive is it to the walls and ceilings it has to come through? My hallway is on the first floor, and the tube would have to come down from at least the second floor, maybe even the third or attic floor. That dark hallway is under the home's main stairway, so the closest ceiling is above that. If they have to install this thing through walls, can they fit in there without having to create a box or a channel for it? In other words, will it take up more room than there is within the walls?

Thanks so much for all this valuable information and the very telling photographs.

Solartubes are great! We had two of them installed in a dark family room in our last house, and they brought in so much natural light. Like night and day (pardon the pun!). We had them professionally installed and never had any leaking issues. I remember them being very reasonably priced (it was about 12 years ago). Soooooo worth the money!

I'm thinking they can't go through walls - you need a direct route to the roof. I wanted to put these in my upstairs hallway because it's sortof dark and closed in. I went with fluorescent bulbs in the lights instead, so I keep them on more frequently since I'm not paying $$ to keep them on with the fluorescent bulbs.

I do wonder how bright they are if they do have to go through an entire story to the roof? Does the reflective tube work well with that long of a distance?