Maker Pro
Maker Pro

Solar Panel and Battery Array Project.

john2k

Jun 13, 2012
188
Joined
Jun 13, 2012
Messages
188
Hi Guys,

I'm in the process of doing up my garden and need some help with the electronics aspect of the design.

I will mainly be powering 12V LED lights in the garden along with a 1A pond pump. The plan is to run this of an array of 12V batteries. I'm thinking to start with maybe 3 batteries wired in parallel, each battery has 75Ah capacity, so if i'm understanding it correctly: by wiring 3 batteries in parallel, i get a total of 12V but combine the AH so 3x75aH will give me 225aH. Is this correct?

The next plan is to use 2x 12V solar panels to charge the batteries. The reason it's for 2 is because i have two sun exposed recesses on my roof (one on each side) but putting on one recess will look slightly strange. Should I go for 2x 100W panels? Also, any advice on how I can wire the 2 panels to charge and regulate my battery array?

I believe I need a solar charge controller/regulator between the battery and the solar panel. The panels I am looking at come with it. So do I need one per panel or one for both panels?

Also, thinking of adding some sort of meter to measure current etc. and came across something like this:

$_12.JPG


It has the following specs:

• Power 0 - 6554 Watts to 0.1W resolution
• Current 0 - 100 Amps (max), 50A continuous, to 0.01A resolution
• Voltage 4 - 60 Volts to 0.01V resolution
• Power flow rate 0 - 6554 Watt-hours (Wh) to 0.1Wh resolution
• Current flow rate 0 - 65 Amp-hours (Ah) to 0.001Ah resolution
• Peak current in Amps
• Peak power in Watts
• Voltage minimum (dip) over monitoring period

Will this work?

Many thanks in advanced
 
Last edited:

john2k

Jun 13, 2012
188
Joined
Jun 13, 2012
Messages
188
I've done a brief sketch of what I think the setup should look like, maybe that will help understand what I am trying to achieve and advise on how best to improve it.

Heres the sketch:

wjj5fk.jpg
 
Top