Solar panels

[2007NNBS]

Is there anyone here running a solar panel to keep the batterys charged on the water?...if so how good do they work?

 

[Captain Ahab]

I have long considered this but have yet to implement a solar charging system.

i do use a solar powered fan to vent my main cabin and must say that I really like how that works. Does not drain the battery when teh boat is docked yet keeps the cabin air nice and fresh.

 

[2007NNBS]

im thinking about getting 2 of them to put one on each of my batterys in my boat one on each side of the boat between the decks which will put them at a angle to gather the sun good

 

[Brine]

I bought a $30 version a couple years ago for a 12volt deep cylcle trolling motor battery.

Testing with volt meter was neglible. In fact, more times than not, it seemed that the panel was drawing more amps than delivering???

 

[Zum]

I don't think they will do much,maybe keep it from loosing a charge if not used for awhile.There more of a maintainer not a charger.
Solar panels are normally rated in watts so the formula to see how many amps there putting out is--Amps=Watts/Volts.
So a 12 watt solar panel puts out about 1 amp.

 

[ben2go]

Solar panels do not provide enough power to keep up with your electrical requirements.It took me 3 days to charge a car battery using a 55watt panel from Northern tool.That was in direct sun light and me turning it every couple hours to keep direct sunlight on it.

 

[redbug]

your trolling motor will draw around 20 amps per hour if not more. the solar chargers wont come close to that.
I have heard of a few guys that will run a portable generator to maintain the batteries on elect only lakes.
I have a Honda eu1000 that I use while I'm at tournaments without a good power supply to charge my batteries.
it will run for 6 hours on .6 gallons of gas and run my 4 bank 60 amp charger and is very quite 37db.

Wayne

 

[rome8899]

Solar panels aren't efficient enough to keep up with the power draw. If they were, you could buy a solar powered trolling motor. The guy I bought my new rig from, used one on top of his garage for charging the batteries ( 2 12 volts wired in a series ). It was the only charging system he used. Now with the windmill technology our new pres. is pushing, we might do better to put one or two of those babbies on our boats and see what happens!!! LOL see ya Scott.