Hi all, first post and seeking advice, well nothing new there right? 8>)
Whilst waiting for my account activation I posted this question on one of the off road forums that has a solar power section, now having access I would like to hear from forum members who can no doubt draw from broader experiences.
Panel spec..jpg
For various reasons I had to change the solar panels on my off road 4x4, there were 2 x 100w panels, one fitted horizontsl to the roof rack and the second on a wandering lead of about 15 metres, both panels were wired in parallel to a 20 amp PWM type controller. Those panels maintained two marine wet cell batteries or around 3 years with no real problems. I only have a small 50 litre fridge to keep working, it draws around 4 amps, but of course only a few minutes out of each hour. On odd occasions when camping and getting two consecutive days of poor sunlight did I consider running the engine but with the VSR protecting the start battery I decided to leave be and sure enough no problems.
Those 2 panels are to be replaced by 2 of the spec seen in the picture above. The difference is now that both are to be fitted to the roof rack and both will be horizontal, given there will be less cable length in use, but no ability to track the sun, would there be any mileage in swapping the PWM controller for an MPPT type but still wired in parallel?
BTW, I tried a medium size picture but could not read the spec, hence the large size.
Any thoughts would be appreciated.
regards
Dave
Whilst waiting for my account activation I posted this question on one of the off road forums that has a solar power section, now having access I would like to hear from forum members who can no doubt draw from broader experiences.
Panel spec..jpg
For various reasons I had to change the solar panels on my off road 4x4, there were 2 x 100w panels, one fitted horizontsl to the roof rack and the second on a wandering lead of about 15 metres, both panels were wired in parallel to a 20 amp PWM type controller. Those panels maintained two marine wet cell batteries or around 3 years with no real problems. I only have a small 50 litre fridge to keep working, it draws around 4 amps, but of course only a few minutes out of each hour. On odd occasions when camping and getting two consecutive days of poor sunlight did I consider running the engine but with the VSR protecting the start battery I decided to leave be and sure enough no problems.
Those 2 panels are to be replaced by 2 of the spec seen in the picture above. The difference is now that both are to be fitted to the roof rack and both will be horizontal, given there will be less cable length in use, but no ability to track the sun, would there be any mileage in swapping the PWM controller for an MPPT type but still wired in parallel?
BTW, I tried a medium size picture but could not read the spec, hence the large size.
Any thoughts would be appreciated.
regards
Dave
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