Re: Unisolar panels (was Re: Removing oxidation from gelcoat)
Reply #3 –
I have two 68-watt Unisolar flexible panels. Their great advantage is that they are 15-inches wide and 11-feet long and flexible enough so that I can install them along the edge of the RV's rooftop (where it's somewhat rounded right at the edge) outboard of air conditioners, vents, etc. This is relatively unused space. Another advantage was the price of $90 each.
Their other advantage is that they still work in partial shade conditions where solid panels reduce their output almost 100% when just a part of the panel is shaded. Since RV roofs have lots of shade potential (air conditioners, antennas, vents, etc.) this is a valuable property. Just a length of rope on a standard panel can reduce its output by 90%!!! But shading a flexible panel barely reduces the output at all.
I also have two 240-watt solid panels rated for 24vdc and an MPPT controller that will accept the two large panels in parallel and the two flexible panels (12vdc panels) in series and then convert everything down to 12vdc for the batteries.
The flexible panels cannot be tilted because they will be glued to the RV roof with their own bonding agent (peel and glue). The solid panels will be mounted using VHB tape on mounting points that will allow me to at least tilt the panels somewhat to increase their efficiency.
This gives me at least the possibility of over 600-watts of power. On the DC side I am slowly converting all interior and exterior lighting to LED. All incandescent lights have been changed already and the fluorescent lights will be changed as ballasts fail. I expect that furnace fans in the winter will be the biggest drain in terms of amp-hours.
On the AC side, we installed a 1500-watt "pure sine" inverter last month. The TV and BluRay together draw less than 40-watts of power. Microwave would be the largest single point draw but if I go to a standard refrigerator system that will change and I might have to move to a larger inverter. With any luck the pricing for those will drop further over the next few years.
The goal is to be able to spend a week-at-a-time on an Ejido beach in Baja with trips to town for water, propane and dumping tanks. Some of these beaches have services for all this (at a price, of course). Works for Quartzite, too. 
Running the generator an hour or so every week just to keep it in decent operating condition seems like another worthy goal.
Craig
Topic: Unisolar panels (was Re: Removing oxidation from gelcoat) (Read 715 times)
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