Homebrewed Electricity > Solar
Making decent solar panels part 1
TomW:
conntaxman;
Pull your cranium from your anus.
Oz has been here forever and he has made panels.
Any more of this and I will petition the mods to put you in the read only room for a year.
Tom [retired admin]
TinnerD:
I like all the input here, as I am building an addition to my barn with extra space for a Solar Work-shop. I will soon have the expansion in the dry, so I have been searching for good suppliers for cells and encapsulation material with no luck.
I have heard horror stories from others with e-bay auctions.
Any help would be deeply appreciated.
conntaxman:
TinnerD . Try buying from people in the UAS. and try not to use "split or broken" cell.
you will see that they are cheaper, but they sure are not worth it.I have make mine and so far they are on the 4 year mark and still running strong. Also try to buy a MPPT controller, that will get you a little extra power from your panels.
Good luck and have fun,nice to see someone build a panel.
Their are many that will put you down for DIY panels, don't let that bother you.
John
AcWxRADAR:
OZ,
Really "AUSome" write up! I enjoyed the read very much.
I noticed your mention of Sylgard. I do believe that this is how it is spelled and it is a Dow-Corning product. I used to use this quite a bit in the aviation field for weather radar aboard aircraft. It serves as an electrical insulation and moisture barrier potting compound for the magnetron's high voltage power leads in the RCVR/XMTR unit. It prevents arcing and corona around the terminals when the aircraft is at high altitude.
I was looking this up not too long ago and it is called Sylgard 184 and runs about US $350 per ~3 quarts??? (4 Kg), maybe more expensive by now. When you mix it up (it is a two part elastomer product), there are thousands of tiny air bubbles in it and it has the consistency of flowable silicone rubber sealant.
We would mix up a small batch and pour it into the area around the HV terminals of the transformer in the unit and put the entire radar RCVR/XMTR unit in an altitude chamber and pull a vacuum on it, pumping down the pressure or upping the vacuum slowly - however you want to look at it. We would basically simulate the conditions at 52,000 feet of altitude. The air bubbles would boil out of the Sylgard until it was perfectly clear. Then we would bring the chamber back down to sea level (or ground conditions) and remove the RCVR/XMTR from the chamber and put it in just a regular home kitchen stove (oven) with the temperature control hard set to 200°F for X amount of hours to cure it.
The end result was a perfectly clear, untinted, unshaded block of "silicone-like" rubber with zero bubbles. It was so clear that if it were 30 foot thick, you could see through it just like pure, clear glass.
Which brings me to a question for you. You mentioned "IRON FREE" glass. I don't know what the reason behind this is. Why is this important? Is it the translucency of the glass? The clarity? Or some other property that would block certain wavelengths / UV?
Thanks OZ
RADAR
PS I don't intend to go out and build panels for myself, I just want to learn all about them and the theory so I know better how to buy them and treat them after I get them.
fabricator:
--- Quote from: conntaxman on December 07, 2012, 12:43:40 AM ---TinnerD . Try buying from people in the UAS. and try not to use "split or broken" cell.
you will see that they are cheaper, but they sure are not worth it.I have make mine and so far they are on the 4 year mark and still running strong. Also try to buy a MPPT controller, that will get you a little extra power from your panels.
Good luck and have fun,nice to see someone build a panel.
Their are many that will put you down for DIY panels, don't let that bother you.
John
--- End quote ---
WTF is your problem? You do of course realize that OZ wrote parts 1, 2, and 3 of this series right? Get a clue pard.
Navigation
[0] Message Index
[#] Next page
[*] Previous page
Go to full version