Solar panel battery charger.

So, OP - which direction you heading with things for your trip?

 

colinb17 - you ever get your solar in? I just put in a 100w panel on my rig, curious if you put your 250w in.

 

not yet. been really busy the last month and a half and haven't had more than a couple hours free at any given time. I did toss about 5 watts worth of panels on my dash though. hooked them up to a trickle unit to maintain the battery. seems to be doing well. takes the 24v from the panels, drops it down to 12, and then runs through 3 charge modes.

 

Nice. Here is my in progress install with a 100w 12v panel:

 

Blue sky is a great company. Just used their high voltage $550 box for a different project, running 500 watts through it with 50v coming from the panels, and 12v coming out the other end.

You order through solar town?

 

I just became familiar with BlueSky - but I do like their products. I got the 2512ix-hv. I thinks its rated up to 350w and 50V max. I over built the system with the charge controller and remote I got in case I want to expand in the future.

I got it all from www.amsolar.com - awesome and knowledgeable guys!

 

overkill is the way to go with this stuff.

I actually just won an engineering design competition with a project that incorporated the SB50L. amazing unit. i think i may end up with the 250 watt panel on my off road trailer, and toss the boost regulator in a watertight box with a battery on the tongue.

about half way wired, without any tuning.


the project she was installed on






mid way through final wiring into the sample "house". there's an inverther, transformer, and some other dodads in there as well.

 

^^^ cool stuff - seems like a cool project, was it for efficient homes? I see the AMVIC material also.

those 250w panels are big. I stayed with a 12v 100w panel for now due to it meeting my current needs and size:

Pmax = 100 watts @ maximum power​

Vmpp = 17.7 volts @ maximum power point​

Impp = 5.7 amps @ maximum power point ​

Length = 40.8" (1037mm)​

Width = 20.7" (527mm)​

Depth = 1.38" (35mm)​

Weight = 14.5 lbs. (6.6kg)


With the bluesky MPPT boost - it sees close to 7.5amps to the batteries in good conditions.


This is used to charge my 100amp/hr aux battery during extended camp stays. It powers my ARB fridge, 600w inverter, LED lights, etc. Figure it feeds back about ~35amp/hr a day on average to keep me topped off nice without ever having to restart.

I did not fix the panel on the car. I have the option to plug the panel into MC4 connectors I terminated between the bed and cab or use the 25' extension cable (also using MC4's) to move the panel farther away so I can park in the shade and locate the panel in the sun.

Once the wiring is all cleaned up I will post some more pics.
​

 

it was for an "affordable" net zero home. typical startup costs for a net zero home can mean a 20+ year payback period to break even. through the AMVEC, solar, and a number of other high efficiency methods (some brand new, some old), mixed with some savy investment and banking strategies, we were able to engineer the payback period down to 5 years (and have numbers to support it).

They are quite large, but at 250 watts and almost 50 volts a piece, they pack a mean punch. with it set up indoors (mathematically equivalent to an overcast day), we were running 3 lights, powering a 200 watt stereo, charging an 18v cordless drill battery, and still charging our battery bank.

Edit: that's obviously the short version. there's a 500 page report to go along with it.

 

sounds like a fun project. i am pretty new to solar and this is my first swing at it. I am sure I will learn a lot more and adjust my setup for my needs once I put it to real use on a few trips coming up this month.

 

with the exception of adding more wattage to your PV system with another or larger system, the solar seems spot on. What you may want in the future though is a larger inverter. if you start pulling higher amperages for tools or other equipment for trail repairs, etc, you may exceed the 600w inverter pretty quickly.

 

I agree - I figure I can upgrade to a 150w panel if I need more power or run two of these 200w panels to expand.

My National Luna Power pack (which the inverter connects to - Xantrex 600w puresine pro watt) has a 60amp breaker built in and they do not recommend a bigger inverter than 600w use on it. I really did want 1000w, but so far 600w seems sufficient (540w constant usable). I don't run any power tools for trial repairs - mainly for charging things (phone, etc). My ARB 50qt fridge plugs into a separate 12v Hella outlet so it doesn't use any inverter capacity.

 

you could always just run a larger inverter directly from the main battery instead of the power pack if needed. for charging electronics though, you're right, 600w is plenty.

i just use my built in 400w inverter 90% of the time, and hook of the 5000w inverter with gator clips as needed.

 

So, smart guys -> I have needs and stuff incoming as well as stufs here already. -

I want to drop in 3 34/78 Optima's in the truck.
This came in the mail yesterday also.
http://img.tapatalk.com/d/13/06/20/e9adydyj.jpg


Can any of you put an Oscilloscope to the 120v of our OEM 400W inverter and post a pic of the "wave" it produces? Please? Actual sine wave being more efficient.

Some of the questions I have are
1. this is a 2200W inverter. Does that mean it will always put 2200w unless there is a peak up to 4400w? or will it only put out whatever the actual draw is?
2. Where are you people mount the national luna? Also your power inverters, charge controllers, etc.?
3. My plan is to add solar to the roof of my truck also. What are some high efficiency panels?
4. I also have a 370Amp Alternator being built for me. Overkill? I plan on lots of LED Light bars for 360 coverage at night. Full under carriage LED's for camping/ rock crawling/ approach lighting. \
5. plans for AV in the truck, 8" Alpine in the dash, 2 headrest monitors, and 2 LED tv's in the bed with 2-4 xbox's running, 85qt WHYNTER freezer/fridge, chargers for cell phones, rice cooker, and a couple small fans.

 

Why not run 2 Odyssey/Sear Die Hard Platinum 31m? It fits in the stock battery location on the new tacomas fine, they are 100Ah ea vs only 50 for the optima you are buying - so 2 31m get you 200Ah vs 150 for 3 optima -most likely cheaper also.

I do not know what kind of wave the stock 400w makes but I assume it cheap and its not a pure sine wave. I only use mine when/if I have to, otherwise it just sites there.

1) it will only put out what actual draw is - i.e. 500w coffe maker, it will only put out 500w. Check manual for max surge rating and constant power rating.

2) I use a NLPP - has everything built in. You will need to put the appropriate size breaker for the 2200w invert though and appropriate cable size. See pics below where my NLPP, charge control, inverter, etc. are (all on a platform I built behind passenger seat for my ARB 50 fridge)

3) what kind of wattage do you want/need? knowing your daily consumption rate can help here. I got a single 100w panel, very small and efficient GS-100:
http://www.amsolar.com/home/amr/page_13_20/gs100_solar_panel.html
get a good MPPT charge controller also to maximize power.

Costco has cheaper ones that are a little bigger:
http://www.costco.com/Grape-Solar-100-Watt-Polycrystalline-PV-Solar-Panel.product.100054656.html


4) that's big, but depends on your actual power consumption/needs to decide if its overkill - check all your light for what output rating are.

5) add up all the power consuption of all these units - this will tell you the size inverter you need. then you need to decide how often each device will be on each day (in hours) then do the math to see if your battery bank and inverter will supply the power you need.

This is a good read... http://www.solarrvpanels.com/index.php/understanding-your-power-consumption/

 

#5 will be on road trips and thats about it for the total.
#1 I WAS thinking that was the case, but it has been 15 years since my ET classes.
#2 WOW - I see everything is in the cabin. I will have a total of 6 people at any given time including myself so that cannot work for me unless I disassembled it and got real creative with the install.
#4 it is big, but it is the same case with #1, only puts out what is needed at the time.
#3 also will vary, but have always been a firm believer in rather have MORE than is needed just in case.

I was NOT aware of that with the Sears battery's. Still think I could do 3 of those? 2 in the same OEM spot and one on the opposite side over the wheel well.

As for charger controllers. Have you looked at any of the ones that HomeDepot sells online? Or are they garbage? They sell panels too. Alternatively, I could get some from Amazon. I guess. Always looking for the best deals. Any specific ones you recommend? Or some better than others?

 

Just curious... how much energy was you able to recover from those high bay lights?

 

Ok please, Please, PLEASE don't tell us you just drywall screwed all that to your dash?

 

I would suggest that you forget about a solar battery charger. They are just too small to charge a battery so that it will start a vehicle unless you have several days of wait time. They are mostly maintainers not battery chargers.

You need to first understand amp hours. For instance if you have a 100 amp hour batter and it is dead it would take approximately 100 hours of charging at 1 amp. Keep in mind this is theoretical. I have a Sunforce 50032 15 Watt (1.5 amps) Solar Battery Charger on my boat. If I run the battery down while fishing (to 11.8 volts) and try and use the solar charger to charge it back up it would take about 65 to 70 hours of sunlight to bring it back to full charge. So all I use it for is a maintainer not a charger. By the way that one costs around 90 dollars.

Now that being said if you invest in a really big one, lets says one that is rated at 60 watts ( 5 amps) they cost about 250 dollars but they are also very big and not practical to carry around and they would still take about 20 hours of sunlight to charge a dead battery back to full charge.

There are several other choices. One is to get another battery and wire it into the system in parallel giving yourself double the amp hour capacity. You should also use an Automatic Battery Protector. Something like this

$115 PriorityStart ProMax Car Truck 12V Battery Vehicle Start Protector

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0030A10V0 or this

$90 Battery Protector (T1) - 12V

http://www.amazon.com/Battery-Prog-Brain-T1-Protector/dp/B000T3236M to monitor the batteries and shut everything down so the batteries cannot be run down beyond starting capacity.

Another is to purchase a small generator. Something like this http://www.homedepot.com/p/Sportsma...table-Generator-GEN154/100637533#.UcNz7b4o7cs and run your equipment with a pure sine wave converter or use the generator to charge your truck battery using a converter. Still it will take some time if the battery is dead.

Just keep in mind there just is not any solar chargers that put out enough watts to charge a dead battery in a couple hours, even in 5 or 10 hours, that are affordable and small enough to carry around. A small generator with a pure sine wave converter would be the best choice.