Vehicle solar panels to grid

[IamIan]

Originally Posted by oil pan

The fan is gobbling up 5 to 10 watts more than it needs to.

Can you tap off the fan of the inverter? .. That one might already be temperature and power regulated.

More energy efficient than a resistor would be a mini switching regulator (DC-DC) ... there are some tiny ones out there ... Example 10grams 96% efficient up to 25W.

Down to 3 Grams for the ~6W Version...Link

Originally Posted by oil pan 4

I am putting a lot of solar capacity on there, 100 watts right now, 40 more watts worth are in the mail and I may expand it further up to 200 watts.

Are these mounted to the vehicle?
If so .. pics please

[oil pan 4]

This is a simple dumb no name inverter. It runs the fan all the time.
The voltage needs to be stepped down with a resistor mostly for reliability.
My smart standalone Kisae and Xantrex pure sine wave inverters don't run the fan at all if they don't need to.

The grid tie inverter will not be part of the vehicle, it will stay in the garage.

Yes these solar panels will be RTV'ed to the roof just like the 4 little solar panels on my old blue suburban.

[oil pan 4]

Putting these panels on is pretty easy.
You have to get fiberglass backed epoxy panels, they are about 2mm thick.
All you really have to do is drill holes to run the wires inside, put a thin bead of RTV around the edge of the panel. Then hold the panels in place for about 12 hours with something heavy. I use 25lb bags of lead bird shot. On the 10 watt panels I cover the panel with 3 of those shot bags. I only have enough shot to do 2 solar panels at a time.
Since I work 12 hours a day I wont try to add any more panels till I am off from work.

[oil pan 4]

MPPT technology rules.
I charged the optima battery up last night, drove to work with no alternator and one 10 watt panel installed turned off the suburban about the time the sun was coming up.
Worried that I might have a weak battery after work since its dark when I get out of work. I put the key in and it fired up stronger than ever.
I am starting to think 14 of these might be over doing it a tiny bit.

[oil pan 4]

2011 solar panels that were not new when I got them:


New solar panels.

[oil pan 4]

After the addition of the white plug to tapped into raw solar panel power for the grid tie. I am done adding circuitry so I put some conduit around it and secured it with ALDL connectors.

[Daox]

Love the nice cleanly laid out work!

What panels did you go with and where did you get them?

[oil pan 4]

I am installing 10 watt, 21ocv panels I got off ebay from a seller called ecoworthy.
Price was around $2/watt.

[Daox]

Thanks! I've never seen those fiberglass backed panels. They're very interesting and look like a great option for those of us who need something thin.

[oil pan 4]

Originally Posted by hootis

I am thinking about putting two 100 Watt solar panels on my car, adding a second or larger battery then after some testing remove the alternator. I estimate I will, on average get 100-125 watt/hours during the day, out of the 200 watt system because they will never be angled correctly towards the sun.

I should mention that large efficient traditional glass topped aluminum sided mono crystal panel in the picture is only an 80 watt panel.
I would like to know how you are going to put 200 watts of solar panels on your car. The roof of my suburban will only hold about 180 watts.
For a car, realistically 100 watts is a lot.

With my 90 watts of panels installed and laying flat I am only getting 40 watts.
But I am in New Mexico. You are in the north east. I lived in Maine for 4 years.
I know what its like in the north east, you can easily go 10 days with over cast skies in the winter. Then when the sun is out its at a much shallower angle.
If I had driven to new England this weekend I would expect my 90 watts worth of panels to produce nearly 0 power given the overcast this weekend.
Then when the sun does come out, I would expect to see 30 watts at noon from a 100 watt panel and MPPT charger if I were lucky. I believe 100 watt hours is over optimistic for most days. If you don't have an MPPT charger controller, well forget about coming any where near 100wh per day.
In newmexico I have solar power to burn. Up north, you do not.

So far I have spent roughly $1.5 on the grid tie half of the power system.
I installed an AL/CU connector that I other wise would have not installed.
That white power plug, I have a whole box full of them removed from dead uninterruptable power supplies.