Score!

[Joel]

Guy I work with is hooking me up.  He has a number of 10" x 4'x 1/4" glass display shelves from department stores he is giving me to use for mounting my cells. I figure these should work well as they would be tempered and not contain any UV blocking glazes as window or door glass may contain. Not my ideal solution as I will not be able to create 12v panels with them, but I will be able to create 6v panels that I will wire in series for 12v. Added benefit is the panels will be lower profile sitting on my roof.

For those who have done this type of thing before, what gauges of wire are recommended to inner-connect the cell-arrays, the pannels and the pannels to the battery-pack?

Now to play with some batteries and decide on what type of inverter I'm going to use...

Joel

[tecker]

 Keeping the current or voltage down in each panel is not a bad idea any how .The traces and interconnect wire is not good for more than 2 to 3 amps and it also will help heat accumulation .the weight is also a factor so multiple small panels works for me I'm going to opt from 9 volt panels .

[iFred]

I am using #22 guage wire which will handle 3-5 amps without problem, however on teh main two output wires, I use an #18 - #14 guage stranded wire. There is'nt as much current as you may think. Only at peak Sun will you get the actual 3 amps. most times it's between 1-2.5 amps.

[Joel]

Finally assembled one 6 volt panel and I am really happy with the results.  I ended up using 26 AWG tinned bus wire and doubled it up (had it lying around).  Seems to work fine.  Frame was made using an 8' length of 3/4" C channel aluminum from Home Depot.  Mounting strips were added using 1/2" aluminum angle.  Pop-rivets held the angle pieces to the frame and also doubled as extra support for the 1/4" glass top.  Placed outside today (mixture of full sun and clouds) the array puts out enough power to brightly light a MAG light 6 volt bulb and run a 9VDC geared motor at what looks like full speed.

Using my el-cheepo Radio Shack meter I read 9.6 VDC open voltage and 6.3 VDC with the bulb in place (not sure if I'm testing correctly for the short-circuit measurement).  The meter has a max DC amp rating of 200 MA (and the probe ports seem to be mislabled) so I do not trust the reading I get and will not report it.

Left to do with this panel is fill with a dry gas.  I'll be using helium.

In the future, if I purchase glass for use in the panels, I will purchase 11"x36.5" sections.  The 10"x36.5" works ok but the frame shades about 1/4" of the top and bottom row of cells.

One down, 3 more to go...

Joel