first time diy. no electricity experience

[jakubman1]

Hello I'm out here in the sunshine state looking to build my own panel from scratch. I bought 70 watt untabbed 3x6 solar cells for 20$. Where do I buy the glass that the cells lay on ? So far I have the solder wire. The bus wire abd the wire that's suppose to be connecting all the cells to each other. Where should I start ? I want to encapsulate them with qs1 stuff off eBay.2 part stuff. I'll use a wood frAme since I have scrap laying.around. do I go pt wood or regular ?

[PNPmacnab]

It will be a wonderful educational experience. Many people buy dead solar panels, I just sold two panels for $30. A deal for glass and frames. You need low iron glass which is about impossible to find. If you manage to actually make it function, it will die from contamination in a year or two. That is the experience I have been told from those that have built these. Certainly worth a try and you haven't spent much. Afterwords, it will certainly make that $100 panel a lot more appealing.

[jakubman1]

So is it best to buy new from Amazon ? What's a good.bran name for the price ? I found 1 panel 100watts 12v with controller and some wires for less than 200$

I thought he homemade solar panels would last longer thAn a couple years

[SunEagle]

So is it best to buy new from Amazon ? What's a good.bran name for the price ? I found 1 panel 100watts 12v with controller and some wires for less than 200$

I thought he homemade solar panels would last longer thAn a couple years

Since the price of manufactured panels have come way down it makes it much harder to justify a DIY project of individual cells.

Along with the fact that unless you can keep all the moisture out of the DIY panel they just do not last anywhere as long as expected.

Maybe if you lived in the desert where the humidity is always very low, just about any other DIY panel degrades quickly due to the weather.

As for purchasing low cost panels on Amazon. It depends but based on the latest info the higher wattage panels are usually much less costly / watt then the panels around 100 watts.

[bcroe]

Hello I'm out here in the sunshine state looking to build my own panel from scratch. I bought 70 watt untabbed 3x6 solar cells for 20$. Where do I buy the glass that the cells lay on ? So far I have the solder wire. The bus wire abd the wire that's suppose to be connecting all the cells to each other. Where should I start ? I want to encapsulate them with qs1 stuff off eBay.2 part stuff. I'll use a wood frAme since I have scrap laying.around. do I go pt wood or regular ?

I have aluminum frames with tempered glass mounted. And termination strips + cell guides. But shipping is difficult, from NW ILL.
There are professional places that will sell tempered glass your specified size; you can't cut it. My last panel was from a screen door.

I measured my cells before using them, rejected a few. 6 X 6 are so likely to crack, I gave up on them. Bruce Roe

[PNPmacnab]

Certainly not against DIY. I'm controlling much more than a KW of panels with $15 for the basic MPPT controller electronics that is all home built. Love all the old UPS supplies I get at the town dump. Recycle America. I joke with people that my entire off grid solar system for my summer home cost less than my wife's wine bill for just a few summers. When she sends me in, the receipt gives to total spent so far for club points. Money well spent. At least I haven't pissed my money away on solar.

[jakubman1]

Pnpm. What are you getting at the dump ?

someone can throw a good bran name out there I can find on eBay or Amazon that would.be great

[jakubman1]

http://www.ebay.com/itm/200660291207

this is what I ordered . How do I solder them in series . I know it can't be too difficult

[Mike90250]

Welcome.
First, understand that DIY panels are going to be only fun toys. They will last a season or three, Just about everything in them will be a compromise, But you can still learn a lot.
Soldering. It's an art. You are going to have a fair amount of breakage on the cells, use those for your practice, For $50 you can get an adjustable temp soldering iron. In the old days, with rosin electrical flux, a extra hot iron would solder copper wire to copper terminals just fine.
Soldering tabbing ribbon to metalized wafers is a lot tougher. When you have it down, you can match the iron tip width to the tab ribbon width, and do a whole row in a couple minutes with just one motion. Assume 2 months practice to get to that point. Too hot, you dissolve the metal layer off the back of the wafer, too cool, and it never solders, so you have to be able to regulate the temp

[inetdog]

+1
The days of regulating the joint temp by how long you hold the soldering iron on are long gone. Especially when the metal mass you are soldering to is tiny!

[Guest]

I suggest going to a local Glass shop. And Ask if they have "Tempered Glass" Not the solar panel kind. But for DIY that will resist hail for sure. And cheaper I guess. But Depends how thick you get the glass to withstand such hail.
And if you want to go the extra mile and test your tempered glass. you could always load a paintball gun with some hard ice. j.k

For me Living in Canada. Finding Tempered glass is like- finding a needle in hay stack. It just dont exist.
On Ebay the only person I see selling full size low Iron tempered glass is "American Solar Supply".


I also suggest a white reflective coating, so when sun hits panel the nice white dosnt heat up cells fast.

Despite what you heard about wooden panels. Ive made store front signs with paint. I am a artist. And the most important part about painting wood to make it last and not degrade is lots of varnish and coatings. apply several several layers after each layer dries. And my signs have not degraded in over 10 years not even color.
I suggest also paint with white reflective paint several layers also. dry and paint dry and coat. multilayering works best.

And then for the inside of the panel itself- I suggest sealing it as best as possible with Caulking gun. seal that sucker up. After one Seal place again another layer and another layer. I say atleast 4 layers. And also do this for the outside seams as well. And also caulking screw holes as well.

Also Another thing. Is that there is some -Spray on products I hear you can get that Resists water. And gives the exterior a rubber like surface? Not sure- but sounds kewl.
Also use lots and lots of wood glue so it also helps like seal. make sure you cover it evenly and leave no spaces with the glue- even it out perfectly. then apply and screw sucker on. Also you may want to use Very Thick wood. dont cheap out and get thin stuff. The thicker the better. If it were me I wouldnt use anything less than 2x4 for frames. I suppose in Theory the Thicker the wood the less it expands and contracts with weather temp changes. Paint and coat and varnish all your pieces. And even Dip your screws in glue. And maybe do sum reasearch on wood. Perhaps Ceder or Oak would work best.


And then me thinks if you wanted to go a step further. To reduce water moisture you can build the frame with the Tempered glass. But perhaps within this setup you have two really thin pieces of glass and encapsulate cells within the two sheets of glass. this will decrease efficency but atleast it will hold up to very little moisture. And then just SEAL SEAL SEAL along the edges of the two thin sheets with your solar cells inbetween those two glass.
And Remember SEAL SEAL SEAL dont let any crack go unsealled!

also. All you have to know about soldering solar cells is.. Top is Negative. Bottom is Positive. dont forgets it

[jakubman1]

Ok so what ive done so far is picked up a renogy 100v mppt charge controller ,1 100 watt renogy mono panel for like 140 off amazon.I picked up a cheapie from walmart just for fun. and a cheapie 35ah sealed lead battery. Now everything is working. Since i over shot the moohoo voltage thing. it would not work so thats why i got this mppt.

What my issue now is safety. How do i ground everything to prevent shocking myself or whatever? Do i just take 1 8ft lighting rod and locate that next to my panels then wire the bare copper wire to the panels THEN connect that same wire all the way 65ft to my charge contoller and what not?
Message_1487178724079.jpg

I watched that tinhat man series on youtube. i also wanted to get the duracell 6v golf cart batteries 4 of them to make a 24volt battery array.

Thanks everyone for the input. I had shower doors laying around the house and they are super thick and i used that qsil silicone and it sticks good.

[bcroe]

That looks neat enough, are they generating the current you expected? At 65' a higher voltage panel configuration
will help reduce losses feeding your MPPT controller. Let us know how they hold up. Bruce Roe

[Mike90250]

For grounding, look to this post from Sunking, in the general discussion forum

https://www.solarpaneltalk.com/forum/solar/the-pros-and-cons-of-solar-energy/341217-ground-tutorial

https://www.solarpaneltalk.com/forum/solar/the-pros-and-cons-of-solar-energy

[Sunking]

At 24 volts, there is no requirement to ground the system.