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  • Motolux
    Junior Member
    • Jun 2023
    • 2

    New from Ontario need some help

    Hi everyone, I’m new to solar, just went off grid in a tiny house I’m building, I bought an energizer arc5 power station, I’ve been running a single 100w panel to charge it until today when I got another one, I’ve been leaving it plugged into the panel 24/7 and it only charges to 99% on solar

    I had one night it randomly drained to 0% in 2 hours when it normally only goes to 70% running all night keeping my phone charged and running a fan, after that happened I charged it with a wall plug at a family members house and it went to 100% like it should and stopped charging

    I ran it off my solar for the week and it was fine charging up to 100% and now it’s back to only hitting 99%, I’ve also noticed with solar even when charged it still shows an input wattage and when plugged into a wall once it finishes charging it drops the wattage to 0, the wall plug output is 19v at 4.74a, the panel specs are vmp-17.1v, imp-5.5a, Voc-21.5v, isc-6.1a,

    is this normal when charging with solar and an mppt charge controller?
  • J.P.M.
    Solar Fanatic
    • Aug 2013
    • 14926

    #2
    Ontario Canada or Ontario, CA ?

    Comment

    • Motolux
      Junior Member
      • Jun 2023
      • 2

      #3
      Originally posted by J.P.M.
      Ontario Canada or Ontario, CA ?
      I’m in Canada

      Comment

      • AzSun
        Member
        • May 2011
        • 32

        #4
        I would not worry about the 99%. Solar panel output varies widely, the wall plug output is constant. It may have not been fully charged the time it went to 0% in 2 hours.
        I looked at the specs for your unit. It stores a little over 500 watt hours of power. The specs also state it will take 7-11 hours to fully charge from the panel. This is under full sun, all day, with no periods of clouds or haze. It also probably means moving the panels to follow the sun throughout the day. Now that you have 2 panels, you will cut that time in half. Also keep in mind panels usually put out less than advertised. As an experiment, when unit is fully charged, plug in an old fashioned 100 watt filament bulb. If it runs 4 1/2 to 5 hours, you unit is is performing reasonably well.

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