Info on solar panels for recharging batteries.

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Can anyone tell me what kind of solar panels I need for recharging 12 volt or other batteries? I want to use the battery for small RV type lights in the house.

-- Belinda Brown (brownfamily@zebra.net), October 14, 1998

Answers

Hi Belinda,

My files coughed up this URL:

http://www.mamagaia.com/mgosolar.html

-- Bob Barbour (r.barbour@waikato.ac.nz), October 14, 1998.


I'm not sure they have one for 12 volt, but Real Good...at www.realgoods.com has battery chargers for nicad batteries, double As, Cs and Ds. Good stuff there.

-- Donna Barthuley (moment@pacbell.net), October 14, 1998.

Here's two more sources, Belinda, for solar info and products:

http://www.solectec.com/ http://www.sunelco.com/

Good luck!

-- Faith Weaver (faith-weaver@usa.net), October 14, 1998.


And:

http://www.windsun.com

http://www.jademountain.com

http://www.mrsolar.com

-- rocky (rknolls@hotmail.com), October 14, 1998.


I got ours from Roy at Four Winds Renewable Energy (he's in NY, we're in NC). Roy explained very technical information so that I could actually understand it (and didn't make me feel like "that cute little woman, goshdarn, she knows what an inverter is, ain't that sumpn?"). We plan to run our waterbed heater off our panels, besides other stuff, so we'll have at least one dependable source of warmth. You can e-mail Roy for info at:

"Roy @ Four Winds" <4windpwr@infoblvd.net>

-- Aitch (jimp7@mindspring.com), October 15, 1998.



Darned if I didn't forget to include Roy's website. [Sorry Roy]

It's:

http://www.infoblvd.net/4windpwr/

BTW.....I'd recommend him highly. He's very Y2K aware, has spent hours and hours providing people with information, and is very knowledgable.

Thanks, Aitch.

rocky

-- rocky (rknolls@hotmail.com), October 15, 1998.


If you want any information on solar and other power sources, check out Home Power Magazine at:

http://www.homepower.com/

They've got more sources than anyone else, plus you can download the magazine free in PDF format (and that's not the old issues...).

Nice thing I found was that most of the advertisers offered their catalogs FREE to Home Power readers. My experiences with their offers have been very quick response times.

-- j (hemwat@bellsouth.net), October 20, 1998.


I have two 50 watt solar panels and mount with a 10 amp controller and hope to get one more panel(if I can swing it) to charge up my battery bank. I intend to use top quality Marine deep cycle batteries of the type the pro fishing guides around here use to run trolling motors, lights, etc, all day. Question is, if I parallel three batteries and have three panels, with a max charge of 9 amps in bright sunlight,---will this be enuf charging to be able to keep em topped up? I plan only for minor use of the solar---MAINLY to run a fan blower on my Pilgrim wood stove if power goes out. Gonna use an automobile A/C and heater fan blower. Havn't decided on an inverter as yet. Would an inverter to give me the 115 ac and using the original fan system be more efficient? Would be glad of some thoughts on this. Kentucky Bill

-- George W(Bill) Berge Jr (gberge@kih.net), November 02, 1998.

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