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  • "Free?" Solar panels.

    Hello!

    This is my first post here. We have an off-grid cottage in Conway, NH with ~1000 watts of solar on the roof, so an inexpensive upgrade would be handy.

    I ran into a friend who has a stack of about 60 used solar panels that came off a project he has. I took a look at them and see what looks like cracks in many of the cells on every panel I could see. I've never seen this before, so I'm wondering how the cracks affect the cell's performance, so if some panel experts can shed light (sorry for the pun) on this, that would be very helpful.

    I'm trying to upload some pics, but Upload Attachments won't let me. Maybe I can't do this until I have a bit more status on the site?

    Thanks!
    Dan


  • #2
    Hi, I am just up the road in Gorham. My guess is these are defective panels that were replaced with new ones on warranty. Those cracks are most likely defective coating. They may test out fine currently but are probably going to degrade faster than the guaranteed life.(how quickly is a crap shot) I would not worry about them bursting into flame, its far more likely that the panel will decrease in output to the point where you do not have enough power. If they are easy to replace and you have a place to stash some spares out of the weather you may get several years off of them. Of course that means at some point you may need to get rid of the old ones but my guess is you can drop off at the local transfer station for now. In other areas like a lot of Massachusetts, getting rid of dead panels costs money so if you can get rid of them for free at the transfer station, its saving the contractor bucks. (note this may not last forever).

    I would recommend putting in some monitoring for the array output so you can see which way the output is trending. As long as the spares are not in the sun and kept dry, the degradation should be slowed.

    Is this one of the cottages along Passaconaway road along the river?

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    • #3
      The panels were made by ReneSola. I read somewhere about them having cracking issues. The main question is whether they are worth anything at all. What happens to a cell that has a crack? Is that cell just dead?

      We're hidden back in the woods 1/2 mile past the last house, on a dead end road. Nobody ever sees this place unless you fly over. Let me know if you're in the Conway area.

      Comment


      • #4
        Originally posted by DanMc77 View Post
        The panels were made by ReneSola. I read somewhere about them having cracking issues. The main question is whether they are worth anything at all. What happens to a cell that has a crack? Is that cell just dead?

        We're hidden back in the woods 1/2 mile past the last house, on a dead end road. Nobody ever sees this place unless you fly over. Let me know if you're in the Conway area.
        Usually when a solar cell is cracked the flow of electrons is interrupted making it useless. If you have enough of those cracked cells in a panel it can reduce the rated wattage by 50% or more depending on where they are in the overall circuit.

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        • #5
          Most of the those dead end roads have a new house on them .EIther that or the owner of the cabin has set it up as short term rental. I am not familiar with that specific panel but generally if there is cracking in the panel moisture will eventually get into the panels and attack the intercell wiring. If also can cloud the face of the panel. The actual deterioration can vary but at the some point the entire panel can just stop putting out power. One bad panel can alos impact the entire system depending what you are using for charge controller and batteries.

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          • #6
            Once the moisture seal is broken, the panel (or any other solid state part) is
            doomed to failure from moisture. Probably sooner, not later. A cracked panel
            has negative value, how do you get rid of it? Bruce Roe

            Comment


            • #7
              Thanks to everybody that chimed in. So I will consider these panels junk... ....unless I wanted to use them as unsightly siding for my saw mill shed!!!! I suppose I could use them as roofing for the shed and maybe I could get some power out of them along the way. I currently have no power down there. If they produce nothing, that would be fine. Cheaper than buying metal roofing. I'd just have to caulk the spaces between panels. Just thinking out loud.

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              • #8
                Thye do expand and contract so you need a gap. Some folks have done it by rigging up a gutter under the seam. I envision ripping a 2" PVC pipe in half and hanging a half under the seam to the side. If the roof is two panels high, I think you could get away with goopiing the horizontal seam as they can expand out the top and bottom.

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