Off Grid Solar lighting setup

[Bruce Hitzfield]

Hello, this spring I will be receiving two flocks of 1000 laying hens in each. I will be rotating these hen's throughout the pasture with a hoop coop mobile structure.
Due to early spring and late summer lighting, I will need to implement a few hours of solar lighting.

I would be using 5 LED 100 watt light bulbs which have an equivelant of 14 watts. So 70 watts of power needed per hoop coop structure.
My question would be, what types of 12 volt deep cycle batteries I would need or how many and also which preferred wattage of solar panel, or panels.

Thank you!

-Bruce

[Logan005]

is the lighting for heat or actually artificial light? If for heat, LED do not produce much heat and will not work. If you just need light, I bet you could use a smaller wattage bulbs shined on a frosted disk or reflector and get the same effect. when you are dealing with solar and batteries, best to start by reducing your load needs before you even begin. when using batteries, every watt is gonna cost you 6 to 10X the cost of grid power. so if grid is avail, use it.

[Bruce Hitzfield]

Thank you logan005 for your response.

It is not for heat. It's to keep lay rates up. And no, for 7 to 8 months out of the year I will have to be off grid. 4 or 5 of the winter months will be on the grid.
If a frosted disk or reflector could get me up to like 70 or 80 watt equivelant lighting then I can go with that.
I need about 30 lumens of light at ground level in the building. I found that 50 watt equivelant LED bulbs got me just a little under 20 lumens

I'm willing to drop a grand on this setup if I can figure out how to properly set this ALL up.



Frosted disk? Have a link on where I could buy an item like that?

[Sunking]

How many hours will the lights be on? What time of year, and where?

As fo battery no one can answer as you have not stated how many hours the lights will be on. Say 70 watts x 12 hours = 840 Watt Hours, that would require a 12 volt 350 AH battery. Do not use 12 volt batteries in parallel, Use 2-6 volt batteries in series. You wil not find a 12 volt 350 AH battery. They have to be 6 volt 350 AH batteries wired in series. You are talking about a 250 pounds worth of batteries.

As for Solar will require 500 watts and a 40 amp MPPT Charge Controller. Could be more or slightly less depending on location and time of year use.

[Logan005]

frosted Plexiglas can be purchased at a hardware store, you can cut it anyhow you like to fit your particular application. As you can see above, every watt counts, if you can get just the light you need w/o excess, you can save hundreds of dollars and having to lug and maintain huge batteries. either way, if you need over 150 amp hrs, step up to 6 volt batteries and if you need more than that consider a 24 volt system. every situation is different, where are you located or do you know your solar insolation hours? Sunking loves to do the math.

[Bruce Hitzfield]

Sorry SunKing, like I said above, this system would only be used 7 to 8 months out of a year, and throughout that timeline the amount of lighting being used will always change as the days get longer and then shorter.
I live in northeast Indiana US.

I'm thinking that this system would max out at about 7 hours a day in the early spring and late fall. Roughly 3.5 hours in the morning and then another 3.5 hours in the evening. Mid summer I will probably only use 2 hours a day at the most.

My buildings are 20 by 48, 960 square feet. It's approximately 11' tall so with those dimensions I figured I needed 5 100 watt equivalent LED bulbs.

[Sunking]

Sorry SunKing, like I said above, this system would only be used 7 to 8 months out of a year, and throughout that timeline the amount of lighting being used will always change as the days get longer and then shorter. I live in northeast Indiana US.

You have to design for absolute worse case. That will likely be late December and early January. That is when your Sun Hours drop to 2.2 hours, and you have the lights on for the longest time. Fail to do that, and the system will not work and most likely destroy the batteries. So what months will it be running? .

The other issue is 12 volts. You cannot carry 12 volts very far, nor can it carry much power. I do not think you can have one system to power more than 1 building as 1 building the size of yours is a bit of a stretch. The batteries would have to be in the center of the building. Use 120 volts, no problem.

[Bruce Hitzfield]

These hoop coop structures will be stationary (near an electrical source) in the month of November. And the earliest that these structures will be back off grid and in need of solar would be late March or sometime in April. (Depending upon the schedule of my next flock of hen's) Sooooo to answer ur question... I'm getting birds in mid April, so I will start the lighting the day I get them, and hopefully run them solar all the way till November or earlier, depending upon weather conditions. Some years it could be sometime in October.

But ok, I think I catch your drift about planning for the worst. I tried a test solar system last summer and found that I was ruining my batteries rather quickly. Pathetic test.
I don't know much at all about solar nor electrical work in general.

Let me tell you the system I currently have and you go ahead and tell me what to get rid of or add to... Or revise it all completely.

An AC timer switch.
A 400 watt power inverter.
50' foot strand of heavy duty construction cord with 5 light bulb sockets.
Five 14 watt LED bulbs (100 watt)
One 50 watt solar panel.
Two 10 watt solar panels.
A 30 amp charge controller.
And two 12 volt marine deep cycle batteries.

I later heard that you can't wire together solar panels with different watts or it will only draw the lowest wattage... Is this true?

[Bruce Hitzfield]

I dont exactly know what u were saying at the end, but to try to answer... Each hoop coop would need to have its own separate system.
Also, how would I get 120 volts? I am completely lost after 12 or 6 volts. Haha

As for distance... Could I have my power source in the middle and just buy two separate 20 foot strands? Would that gain me power? Or am I looking at this incorrectly?

[Mike90250]

before you go further, make sure the color spectrum of the bulbs, matches the requirements for the hens. Roosters crow before dawn because their eyes also respond to UV.

Banks of fluorescent bulbs generate small amounts of UV. White LED's generate mostly blue, and the phosphor package converts it to a limited spectrum to fool human eyes.

[Bruce Hitzfield]

Yes Mike90250, that is very important indeed. 👍 What type of bulbs would you suggest as appropriate lighting for hen's?

[Mike90250]

Yes Mike90250, that is very important indeed. 👍 What type of bulbs would you suggest as appropriate lighting for hen's?

Not my problem. Just letting you know it may be an issue for you to look at before spending $ on the wrong stuff.

[Bruce Hitzfield]

Not my problem. Just letting you know it may be an issue for you to look at before spending $ on the wrong stuff.

Ok thanks to you mike, I have indeed finalized what type of lighting to go with.

As for my setup, I am still very ignorant on electronics and the language in general. I would love to learn it all, and hopefully someday I will. But I currently do not have the time and need to focus my time elsewhere.

So if any one person here would be very generous and help walk me through an effiecent but effective solar lighting (off grid) setup, I would very much appreciate it.
This is not a hobby of mine to run in my backyard to feed my family breakfast. So I would be willing to compensate anyone's efforts (for a reasonable price) to tell me the following....

What do I need to power five 60 watt equivelant LED bulbs for 8 hours a day through solar lighting? 4 hours in the morning and 4 in the evening.
The lighting would be maxed out at relatively 8 hours a day starting in April and from then on it will dwindle to basically nothing until the summer solstice and from then on it will go all the way back up to 8 hours in late October or early November.
I live in northeastern Indiana.

If you need any further information, please ask away! And feel free to refer to some of my info above in previous posts.

Thank you