Novel Solar tracker from old hard drive

[Junkie]

This is a solar tracker that I built using an old hard drive, some small solar panels
and a few relays. The two solar panels are wires so that they cancel each other out
when they are both in the sun. When the sun is on either side of the sensor the
output become  positive or negative. This is connected to the hard drive read head
which moves either way. On the end of the read head there is a small neo magnet,
that trips the reed switches either side. The reed switches then turn on a relay to control
the motor.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FyszXbUDPM8

I didn't really expect this to work, so I was surprised when it tracked for the first time! 

[Basil]

Very creative.
Now you need to give all details. This I am sure someone here would like to build.
LIKE ME for one.

Here is a drawing of my tracker I made work because my actuatetor had bad limits.
It's work great sense I built it.
http://fieldlines.com/board/index.php/topic,135533.0.html

[Junkie]

Thanks!

It won't let me upload the piccies from my site to here, but I made a page about it, there's a link in my sig line.

[TomW]

It won't let me upload the piccies from my site to here, but I made a page about it, there's a link in my sig line.

Just copy & paste the URL in then highlight it then hit that insert image button above

Thusly:



Tom