160 watts into 350ah OK? 110 ok?

[cottonpickers]

Current set up is 2 qty 55w panels poorly positioned and in UK, into 56ah battery.

I use it to:

In winter: Charge mobile phone & AAs etc

In Spring: From Feb, I can charge 1 laptop

In Summer: From May I can charge both laptops etc

In Autumn: back to only having enough juice to charge 1 laptop.

 http://www.fieldlines.com/story/2008/3/31/16433/4936 gives some idea.

I fancy an upgrade to run both laptops most of the year, and have a cushion for power failures.

I see some (apparently 3 year old) 6v Rolls Surrettes s460 (350ah c10) on ebay for £85 each, and am tempted to get two, and perhaps upgrade the panels to 2 80watt panels later this spring.

Looking for thoughts? My concern is that I'm going OTT on the batteries for my use, but the batteries look like they could be keepers.

Would they sulphate? or self charge a lot? am I wasting money on these?

Appreciate your thoughts. I've read that I need 2% to keep batteries from self discharge.

[ghurd]

The batteries would fine for 110W or 160W.

In the summer, we use about 175W into 12V 660AH, and they stay basically full all the time.  

The loads are modest (laptop, cell phones, some lights, soldering irons, fans), but it is more power than we can use in summer.

G-

[cottonpickers]

Thanks Ghurd - appreciate you taking the time to offer your advice.  Hopefully they will give me some long term storage.  Best regards

CP

[tanner0441]

Hi

I am in the UK.  I have 60W solar with a clear south outlook, my batteries are 3 x 113Ah deep cycle marine batteries. I have been watching them closely. On average my load is 100 to 130 W lighting in the evenings, I find two days of good sun will put back one six  hour period of use.  About every month to six weeks if we have had a period of poor sun I float the batteries for 24 hours with a charger/conditioner.  I also have a small turbine but as I am in such a poor wind area I am going to sell it and buy more panels, where I live sun definitley works better than wind.

I have on several occasions seen my panels make their rated output though on other than good summer days they only manage 40 to 50 W, a totally cloudy day will see about 7.5 W.

Hope this helps

Brian

[bob golding]

hi considering those batteries are  250 quid each new it might be worth a look. if any battery is likely to stand abuse rolls ones are the most likely to survive. of course they could be totally dead ducks depending on how heavily they have been abused. try to get some idea of  how they have been treated first,but if it were me i would go for it. remember they weigh around 50 kgs each.

[cottonpickers]

Thanks guys. Sounds like even in UK I should be ok then with the amp hours.  Consequently my order is in ... Apparently they are about 3 years old, I'm getting 2 out of the 4 for sale, and have asked for a matched pair (hydrometer readings) and asked for them to be equalised for me.. so hopefully they will be ready to go when they arrive.  To be honest, there's a lot of batteries on ebay but usually they are telco batteries and it was the appeal of real deep cycle that appealed to me.

Regarding the weight.. .I've already warned the wife ;-)  all the best

CP

[Junkie]

Should be fine. I have 46W going into a 70ah battery with no problems in a south facing position (UK). Not getting enough power with all this snow though!