Oh F*** NRs Solar panel has arrived and ....

[Scythe13]

As Beardy says, Red is positive, black is negative, and that's worked for my mini install. Small panel on a car battery.

[NorthernRaider]

Havent got a battery so tried wiring without, lots of burnt out 2o amp fuses now, think i will stop playing as the street lights are flickering !! What a fooking daft idea having solar panels that have to be connected to a bleeding great battery before you can access its electricty output, bloody daft.

LS took my radios off me so i cannot play with that anymore cos NASA was objecting and aircraft were trying to land in Tescos car park , now i cant play with this solar doofah cos I have not got a battery BUT BUT BUT Think of the fun I will have when I have a battery and a solar power to create electricty and the battery is fully of hydrochloric acid Bwaaaahhhhh I wonder what I can do with that

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Correct AL not LS took my radios off me

[BeardyMan]

You don't technically need a charge controller on any system. If you wanted to use your new solar panels to power a fountain or something then you could hook it up to the motor of the pump and it would work when the sun shines. The problem is you may be dumping too much power into the motor if you have whacking great big solar panels. If you connected to a battery without charge controller then you do run a fire risk if it's nice and bright outside, or you'll drain your batteries if it's dark

You should be able to wire the panels up to the charge controller though and use the output to power something, even if it's just a little LED light to test that it all works.

If only you lived in a city NR, you'd be close enough to one of us so we could check it out for you

(11 February 2013, 17:22)NorthernRaider Wrote: Havent got a battery so tried wiring without, lots of burnt out 2o amp fuses now, think i will stop playing as the street lights are flickering !! What a fooking daft idea having solar panels that have to be connected to a bleeding great battery before you can access its electricty output, bloody daft.

LS took my radios off me so i cannot play with that anymore cos NASA was objecting and aircraft were trying to land in Tescos car park , now i cant play with this solar doofah cos I have not got a battery BUT BUT BUT Think of the fun I will have when I have a battery and a solar power to create electricty and the battery is fully of hydrochloric acid Bwaaaahhhhh I wonder what I can do with that

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Correct AL not LS took my radios off me

[NorthernRaider]

Dont think 18 volts and 10 amps of direct VDC would do my sons I phone much good.

[Geordie_Rob]

(11 February 2013, 17:27)BeardyMan Wrote: If only you lived in a city NR, you'd be close enough to one of us so we could check it out for you

There's also plenty spare panels here in suburbia just waiting to be liberated after SHTF. Could save a heap load of cash when setting up a solar system. I'm so glad us Geordies evolved from being thick beer drinkers

[NorthernRaider]

(11 February 2013, 17:48)Geordie_Rob Wrote:

(11 February 2013, 17:27)BeardyMan Wrote: If only you lived in a city NR, you'd be close enough to one of us so we could check it out for you

There's also plenty spare panels here in suburbia just waiting to be liberated after SHTF. Could save a heap load of cash when setting up a solar system. I'm so glad us Geordies evolved from being thick beer drinkers

I've got 17 1.5 megawatt wind turbines to play with after TSHTF and a cricket club covered in extra panels !!! :

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(11 February 2013, 17:48)Geordie_Rob Wrote: There's also plenty spare panels here in suburbia just waiting to be liberated after SHTF. Could save a heap load of cash when setting up a solar system. I'm so glad us Geordies evolved from being thick beer drinkers

What do you call an educated Geordie ?

A Mackem

[Geordie_Rob]

(11 February 2013, 17:55)NorthernRaider Wrote:

(11 February 2013, 17:48)Geordie_Rob Wrote:

(11 February 2013, 17:27)BeardyMan Wrote: If only you lived in a city NR, you'd be close enough to one of us so we could check it out for you

There's also plenty spare panels here in suburbia just waiting to be liberated after SHTF. Could save a heap load of cash when setting up a solar system. I'm so glad us Geordies evolved from being thick beer drinkers

I've got 17 1.5 megawatt wind turbines to play with after TSHTF and a cricket club covered in extra panels !!! :

Plenty to practice with then.


At least we aren't fearful racists who hang every monkey in sight incase they are spies. Well not all of us anyway

[NorthernRaider]

Aye monkey hanging Hartlepool those folks still burn witches and tory candidates

[Geordie_Rob]

Well just teesiders in general. I think it's too much smog IMO

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(11 February 2013, 18:06)Geordie_Rob Wrote: Well just teesiders in general. I think it's too much smog IMO

Actually, talking of hanging. Do they stil wear those white hoods? Or is that just a select few members?

[Skvez]

NR,

What rating is your solar panel?
I'll assume its somewhere around 100W

I guess it's too late today to do much testing but tomorrow you can still play…

Solar panel should have two leads coming from it. Hopefully colour red for +ve and Black for -ve.
You can connect these directly to a car brake light/side light to check the solar panel is working, I doubt you'll have enough sunlight to get the Voltage up to the point where you blow the lamp (and even if you do it's only a couple of pounds).

Tell us how many connections the charger controller has.
They usually have 6
2 for the solar panel (+ve and -ve)
2 for the battery (+ve and -ve)
and 2 for the load (+ve and -ve)

A 'good' charge controller will be obvious which connections are for what (little pictures).

If you were serious about it smoking it's probably dead

Many charge controllers must have a battery connected.
The charge controller exists to
1] Regulate the charge into the battery (so you don't over charge it)
2] Shut off the load if the battery gets too low (so you don't over discharge it)
The regulation of the load Voltage is usually left to the battery itself (so the Voltage goes up and down as the battery charges and discharges but not nearly as much as the output of the solar panel).