Solar Workbench

Workbench to manage solar
analysis and configurations.

Features

Configure the sun position

• Manually set the sun position with the location data (latitude, longitude, date and time).
• Automatically set the sun position with location data from epw file.
• Enable the display of the sun representation and the direction of illumination to aid in analysis.
• Activate the display of the solar diagram with representation of months, hours, equinoxes and solstices.
• Save images of the results obtained.

Visualize the sun path animations

• Ability to play the sun path animations in real time prior to recording.

Record and Play (with Movie and Render Workbenches)

• Create frames from the FreeCAD 3D view or the rendered ones.
• Create videos from them.
• Check the results playing the videos you have created.

Tutorials

Sun path shadows study

• BW 3D view option

• Color 3D view option

• Render 3D view option

Setting the sun path and its animatation

Video with object animation by Sketches

(Watch the sample video)

Sky domes analysis

Prerequisites

FreeCAD ≥ v1.0

Installation

Via Addon Manager (Recommended)

Not yet available.

Manually install using GitHub

Expand to read manual installation instructions

• Download the ZIP file (click 'Clone or Download' button above)
• For Ubuntu and similar OS's, extract it inside /home/username/.local/share/FreeCAD/Mod
• For Windows, extract it inside C: \Users\your_user_name\AppData\Roaming\FreeCAD\Mod
• On macOS it is usually /Users/username/Library/Preferences/FreeCAD/Mod
• Launch FreeCAD

Preparation

• To use this workbench, you must have the two ladybug Python packages installed (the pysolar package is optional). There are two basic ways to do this:

  If your operating system's Python version is the same as FreeCAD's, simply open a terminal and type:

  pip install ladybug-core ladybug-radiance pysolar
  

  If the versions are different, you'll need to use Python venv. To do this, go to the Solar Workbench folder (see the address above) or open FreeCAD and type the following expression in the Python console to find the Mod that Solar is in:

  import FreeCAD
  import os
  user_mod_path = os.path.join(FreeCAD.getUserAppDataDir(), "Mod")
  print(user_mod_path)
  

  Create the virtual environment inside the Solar WB folder, to do this, open the terminal system with that path and type:

  python3 -m venv AdditionalPythonPackages # for Python 3, or
  python -m venv AdditionalPythonPackages
  

  Activate the virtual environment (you must use AdditionalPythonPackages as the name):

  source AdditionalPythonPackages/bin/activate # Linux/macOS
  AdditionalPythonPackages\Scripts\activate # Windows
  

  Install packages within the environment (pysolar is optional):

  pip install ladybug-core ladybug-radiance pysolar
  

  Deactivate the virtual environment when finished:

  deactivate
  

• To use Sky Domes, you will also need to install Radiance on your computer (https://www.radiance-online.org/).

• Download and license: https://www.radiance-online.org/download-install

• If you want to use the rendered frames, you must install the Render Workbench (via Addon Manager), prepare rendering projects and test them preventively to make sure everything is working correctly (see information in FreeCAD-Render).

• If you want to use the play and record rendered animation frames, you must install the Movie Workbench (via Addon Manager, and see information in FreeCAD-Movie.

Usage

Sun configuration dialog

Sky domes configuration dialog

To create a SkyDomes, click "Create SkyDomes" button and configure them in the dialog window. To modify a SkyDomes, click "Modify SkyDomes" button with the respective SkyDomes already selected. To delete SkyDomes, select them and click "Delete SkyDomes" button.

IMPORTANT:

• Once Skydomes are created, do not modify their structure of the groups in the FreeCAD object tree, as this will prevent future modifications.

• This is the first implementation of solar domes using the ladybug libraries; therefore, the results obtained may still contain errors or deviations.

• If this occurs, please report it in the forum link indicated below.

Documentation

Documentation will be available as soon as possible.

Feedback

For discussion, please use the Solar Workbench thread in the FreeCAD forum.

License

LGPL-2.1 LICENSE

Author

Francisco Rosa, 2025.