Humanity in order to take care of the environment and save money Money started using alternative sources energy, which, in particular, includes solar panels. Buying such a treat will be quite expensive, but it is not difficult to do this device with your own hands. Therefore, it won’t hurt you to find out how to do it yourself solar battery. This will be discussed in our article.
Solar batteries are devices that generate electricity using photocells.
Before we talk about how to make a solar battery with your own hands, you need to understand the structure and principles of its operation. The solar battery includes photocells connected in series and parallel, a battery that stores electricity, an inverter that converts direct current into alternating current, and a controller that monitors the charging and discharging of the battery.
Typically, solar cells are made from silicon, but its cleaning is expensive, so Lately began to use elements such as indium, copper, selenium.
Each photocell is a separate cell that generates electricity. The cells are interconnected and form a single field, the area of which determines the battery power. That is, the more photocells, the more electricity is generated.
In order to make a solar panel with your own hands at home, you need to understand the essence of such a phenomenon as the photoelectric effect. A photocell is a silicon plate that, when light hits it, knocks out an electron from the last energy level of silicon atoms. The movement of a flow of such electrons produces a direct current, which is subsequently converted to alternating current. This is the phenomenon of the photoelectric effect.
Advantages
Solar panels have the following advantages:
- environmentally friendly;
- durability;
- silent operation;
- ease of manufacture and installation;
- independence of electricity supply from the distribution network;
- immobility of parts of the device;
- minor financial costs;
- light weight;
- work without mechanical converters.
Varieties
Solar batteries are divided into the following types.
Silicon
Silicon is the most popular material for batteries.
Silicon batteries are also divided into:
- Monocrystalline: These batteries use very pure silicon.
- Polycrystalline (cheaper than monocrystalline): polycrystals are obtained by gradually cooling silicon.
Film
Such batteries are divided into the following types:
- Based on cadmium telluride (10% efficiency): cadmium has a high light absorption coefficient, which allows it to be used in the production of batteries.
- Based on copper selenide - indium: efficiency is higher than the previous ones.
- Polymer.
Solar batteries from polymers began to be manufactured relatively recently; usually furellenes, polyphenylene, etc. are used for this. Polymer films are very thin, about 100 nm. Despite the efficiency of 5%, polymer batteries have their advantages: low cost of material, environmental friendliness, elasticity.
Amorphous
The efficiency of amorphous batteries is 5%. Such panels are made from silane (hydrogen silicon) according to the principle of film batteries, so they can be classified as both silicon and film. Amorphous batteries are elastic, generate electricity even in bad weather, and absorb light better than other panels.
Materials
To make a solar battery you will need the following materials:
- photocells;
- aluminum corners;
- Schottky diodes;
- silicone sealants;
- conductors;
- mounting screws and hardware;
- polycarbonate sheet/plexiglass;
- soldering equipment.
These materials are required in order to make a solar battery with your own hands.
Selection of photocells
To make a solar battery for your home with your own hands, you need to choose the right photocells. The latter are divided into monocrystalline, polycrystalline and amorphous.
The efficiency of the former is 13%, but such photocells are ineffective in bad weather and appear as bright blue squares. Polycrystalline solar cells are capable of generating electricity even in bad weather, although their efficiency is only 9%, are darker in appearance than monocrystalline ones and are cut off at the edges. Amorphous photocells are made of flexible silicon, their efficiency is 10%, their performance does not depend on weather conditions, but the production of such cells is too expensive, so they are rarely used.
If you plan to use electricity generated by photovoltaic cells at your dacha, we advise you to assemble a solar battery with your own hands from polycrystalline cells, since their efficiency is sufficient for your purposes.
You should buy photocells of the same brand, since photocells from several brands can be very different - this can cause problems with the assembly of the battery and its functioning. It should be remembered that the amount of energy produced by a cell is directly proportional to its size, that is, the larger the photocell, the more electricity it produces; The voltage of a cell depends on its type, not its size.
The amount of current produced is determined by the dimensions of the smallest photocell, so you should buy photocells of the same size. Of course, you should not purchase cheap products, because this means that they have not been tested. You should also not buy photocells coated with wax (many manufacturers coat photocells with wax to protect products during transportation): removing it can damage the photocell.
Calculations and project
Installing a solar panel with your own hands is not a difficult task, the main thing is to approach it responsibly. To make a solar panel with your own hands, you should calculate the daily electricity consumption, then find out the average daily solar time in your area and calculate the required power. Thus, it will become clear how many cells and what size you need to purchase. After all, as mentioned above, the current generated by the cell depends on its dimensions.
Knowing required size cells and their number, you need to calculate the dimensions and weight of the panel, after which you need to find out whether the roof or other place where you plan to install the solar battery will support the planned structure.
When installing the panel, you should not only choose the sunniest place, but also try to fix it at right angles to the sun's rays.
Stages of work
Frame
Before you start making a solar panel with your own hands, you need to build a frame for it. It protects the battery from damage, moisture and dust.
The body is assembled from moisture-resistant material: plywood coated with a moisture-repellent agent, or aluminum corners, to which silicone sealant plexiglass or polycarbonate is glued.
In this case, it is necessary to maintain indentations between the elements (3-4 mm), since it is necessary to take into account the expansion of the material with increasing temperature.
Soldering elements
Photocells are laid out on front side transparent surface, so that the distance between them on all sides is 5 mm: this takes into account the possible expansion of photocells with increasing temperature.
Converters having two poles are fixed: positive and negative. If you want to increase the voltage, connect the elements in series, if the current - in parallel.
To avoid battery discharge at night, in a single circuit consisting of all necessary details, turn on the Schottky diode, connecting it to the positive conductor. Then all the elements are soldered together.
Assembly
Soldered converters are placed in the finished frame, silicone is applied to the photocells - all this is covered with a layer of fiberboard, closed with a lid, and the joints of the parts are treated with sealant.
Even a city dweller can make and place a solar panel on the balcony with his own hands. It is advisable that the balcony be glazed and insulated.
So we figured out how to make a solar battery at home, it turned out that it’s not difficult at all.
Ideas from scrap materials
You can make a solar battery with your own hands from scrap materials. Let's look at the most popular options.
Many will be surprised to learn that foil can be used to make a solar battery with your own hands. In fact, this is not surprising, because foil increases the reflectivity of materials. For example, to reduce overheating of the panels, they are placed on foil.
How to make a solar panel from foil?
We will need:
- 2 “crocodiles”;
- copper foil;
- multimeter;
- salt;
- empty plastic bottle without neck;
- electric oven;
- drill.
After cleaning the copper sheet and washing your hands, cut off a piece of foil, place it on a hot electric stove, heat it for half an hour, observing blackening, then remove the foil from the stove, let it cool and see how pieces peel off from the sheet. After heating, the oxide film disappears, so the black oxide can be carefully removed with water.
Then a second piece of foil is cut out the same size as the first, the two parts are folded and lowered into the bottle so that they have no chance of touching.
Foil can also be used for heating. To do this, you need to pull it onto a frame, to which you then need to connect hoses connected, for example, to a watering can with water.
So we learned how to make a solar panel for your home from foil yourself.
Many people have old transistors lying around at home, but not everyone knows that they are quite suitable for making a solar battery for the garden with your own hands. The photocell in this case is a semiconductor wafer located inside the transistor. How to make a solar battery from transistors with your own hands? First you need to open the transistor, for which it is enough to cut off the cover, so we can see the plate: it is not large sizes, which explains the low efficiency of solar panels made from transistors.
Next you need to check the transistor. To do this, we use a multimeter: we connect the device to a transistor with a well-lit p-n junction and measure the current, the multimeter should record a current from a few fractions of a milliamp to 1 or a little more; Next, switch the device to voltage measurement mode, the multimeter should output tenths of a volt.
We place the transistors that have passed the test inside a housing, for example, sheet plastic, and solder them. You can make such a solar battery with your own hands at home and use it to charge batteries and low-power radios.
Old diodes are also suitable for assembling batteries. Making a solar battery with your own hands from diodes is not at all difficult. You need to open the diode, exposing the crystal, which is a photocell, then heat the diode for 20 seconds gas stove, and when the solder melts, remove the crystal. All that remains is to solder the removed crystals to the body.
The power of such batteries is small, but it is enough to power small LEDs.
This option of making a solar battery with your own hands from improvised materials will seem very strange to most, but making a solar battery with your own hands from beer cans is simple and cheap.
We will make the body from plywood, on which we will place polycarbonate or plexiglass; on the back surface of the plywood we will fix foam plastic or glass wool for insulation. Aluminum cans will serve as photocells. It is important to choose aluminum cans, since aluminum is less susceptible to corrosion than, for example, iron and has better heat transfer.
Next, holes are made in the bottom of the cans, the lid is cut off, and unnecessary elements are folded to ensure better air circulation. Then you need to clean the jars from grease and dirt using special means, do not contain acid. Next, you need to hermetically seal the cans together: with silicone gel that can withstand high temperatures, or with a soldering iron. Be sure to dry the glued cans very well in a stationary position.
Having attached the cans to the body, we paint them black and cover the structure with plexiglass or polycarbonate. Such a battery is capable of heating water or air and then supplying it to the room.
We looked at options on how to make a solar panel with your own hands. We hope that now you will not have a question about how to make a solar battery.
Video
How to make solar panels with your own hands - video tutorial.
Your own power supply will help you out both in conditions of absence centralized network(in remote and hard-to-reach regions, in the country, on a hike), and when building a more environmentally friendly approach to the consumption of natural resources.
It is not difficult to assemble your own solar station; it contains only four components:
- solar panels;
- battery charge;
- controller;
- inverter
All of them are easy to find and order through online stores. But how to make a solar power plant with your own hands in order to create a full-fledged autonomous power supply system at home? First you need to collect information about your needs, the capabilities of the area where the solar station will operate, and make everything necessary calculations for the selection of constituent elements.
How to calculate the number of solar panels
Choosing a solar station begins with searching for information on insolation in your area - the amount of solar energy that hits the earth's surface (measured in watts per square meter). This data can be found in special weather reference books or on the Internet. Typically, insolation is indicated separately for each month, because the level is highly dependent on the season. If you plan to use a solar station all year round, then you need to focus on the months with the lowest indicators.
Next, you need to calculate your electricity needs for each month. Remember that for autonomous system power supply plays a role not only in the efficiency of energy storage, but also in its economical use. Smaller needs will allow you to save significantly when purchasing solar panels and creating a budget version of a solar power station with your own hands.
Compare your electricity needs with the level of insolation in your area and you will find out the area of solar panels that is needed for your solar station. Please note that the efficiency of the panels is only 12-14%. Always focus on the lowest figure.
Thus, if the insolation level in the most unfavorable month in your area is 20 kWh/m², then with an efficiency of 12% one panel with an area of 0.7 m² will produce 1.68 kWh. Your energy requirement, for example, is 80 kWh/month. This means that in the least sunny month, 48 panels (80/1.68) will be able to satisfy this need. You can read more about how to choose solar panels in our previous one.
How to install a solar panel
For the best efficiency, the solar panel should be installed so that the sun's rays fall on it at an angle of 90 degrees. Since the sun constantly moves across the sky, there are two solutions:
- Dynamic installation. Use a servo to make the solar panel rotate as the sun moves across the sky. The servo drive will allow you to collect 50% more energy than a static installation.
- Stationary installation. To extract maximum benefit from the stationary position of the solar panel, it is necessary to find the installation angle at which the panel will collect the maximum possible amount of sun rays. For year-round operation, this angle is calculated using the formula +15 degrees to the latitude of the area. For the summer months this is -15 degrees to the latitude of the area.
How to choose a charge controller
Another way to assemble a solar power plant yourself to make it work efficiently is to use it, which allows you to track maximum power points (MPPT). Such a controller can store energy even during low light conditions and continues to supply it to the battery in an optimal manner.
So, energy from solar panels goes to the battery. This allows energy to be stored so that it can be used even in the absence of sunlight. In addition, batteries smooth out uneven energy supply, for example, when strong wind or cloudy.
To correctly select and install a battery for a home solar power station with your own hands, you need to consider two parameters:
- It is very important that the charging current (from the panels) does not exceed 10% of the rated capacity level for acid batteries and 30% for alkaline devices.
- Low side voltage inverter design.
Consider battery self-discharge rates (not always indicated by manufacturers). For example, acid devices are recharged every six months to avoid breakdown.
How to choose an inverter
Description of parameters and mandatory functions of an ideal inverter:
- sinusoidal signal with distortion not exceeding three percent;
- when a load is connected, the voltage amplitude changes by no more than ten percent;
- double current conversion - direct and alternating;
- analogue AC conversion part with a good transformer;
- short circuit protection;
- overload reserve.
When modeling your home's electrical system, group the loads so that different types of loads are powered by different inverters.
Solar stations are working alternative way home energy supply. But not in all regions the insolation is sufficient to pay for solar equipment and to fully provide electricity. Sometimes it is worth paying attention to hybrid solar power plants, which can also be built with your own hands, but where, in addition to solar panels, there may be wind turbines, as well as diesel or even gasoline generators.
If you just want to try to “tame” solar energy, but are not ready to completely change the power supply to your home, make a mini solar power station with your own hands. It will consist of several solar panels, a battery and a controller. This will all fit in a suitcase, but will provide you with energy during a sudden power outage, a trip to the country or to nature. Calculations and selection of components follow the same principle as for a full-fledged home station.
Solar panels are a source of energy that can be used to generate electricity or heat for a low-rise building. But solar panels are expensive and are inaccessible to most residents of our country. Do you agree?
It’s another matter when you make a solar battery yourself - costs are significantly reduced, and this design works no worse than a panel industrial production. Therefore, if you are seriously thinking about purchasing an alternative source of electricity, try to make it yourself - it is not very difficult.
This article will discuss the manufacture of solar panels. We will tell you what materials and tools you will need for this. And a little lower you will find step by step instructions with illustrations that clearly demonstrate the progress of the work.
Solar energy can be converted into heat, when the energy carrier is a coolant fluid, or into electricity, collected in batteries. The battery is a generator operating on the principle of the photoelectric effect.
The conversion of solar energy into electricity occurs after the sun's rays hit the photocell plates, which are the main part of the battery.
In this case, light quanta “release” their electrons from the outer orbits. These free electrons give electricity, which passes through the controller and accumulates in the battery, and from there it goes to energy consumers.
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Materials for creating a solar plate
When starting to build a solar battery, you need to stock up on the following materials:
- silicate plates-photocells;
- chipboard sheets, aluminum corners and slats;
- hard foam rubber 1.5-2.5 cm thick;
- a transparent element that acts as a base for silicon wafers;
- screws, self-tapping screws;
- silicone sealant for exterior use;
- electrical wires, diodes, terminals.
The amount of materials required depends on the size of your battery, which is most often limited by the number of solar cells available. The tools you will need are: a screwdriver or a set of screwdrivers, a hacksaw for metal and wood, a soldering iron. To test the finished battery, you will need an ammeter tester.
Now let's look at the most important materials in details.
Silicon wafers or solar cells
Photocells for batteries come in three types:
- polycrystalline;
- monocrystalline;
- amorphous.
Polycrystalline wafers are characterized by low efficiency. The size of the beneficial effect is about 10 - 12%, but this figure does not decrease over time. The operating life of polycrystals is 10 years.
A solar battery is assembled from modules, which in turn are made up of photoelectric converters. Batteries with rigid silicon solar cells are a kind of sandwich with successive layers mounted in an aluminum profile
Monocrystalline solar cells boast higher efficiency - 13-25% and long terms work – over 25 years. However, over time, the efficiency of single crystals decreases.
Monocrystalline converters are produced by sawing artificially grown crystals, which explains the highest photoconductivity and productivity.
Film photoconverters are produced by depositing a thin layer of amorphous silicon on a polymer flexible surface
Flexible batteries with amorphous silicon are the most modern. Their photoelectric converter is sprayed or fused onto polymer base. The efficiency is around 5 - 6%, but film systems are extremely easy to install.
Film systems with amorphous photoconverters have appeared relatively recently. This is extremely simple and maximum cheap look, but losing consumer qualities faster than its rivals.
It is not practical to use photocells different sizes. In this case, the maximum current produced by the batteries will be limited by the current of the smallest element. This means that larger plates will not work at full capacity.
When purchasing solar cells, ask the seller about the delivery method; most sellers use the waxing method to prevent the destruction of fragile elements
Most often, for homemade batteries, mono- and polycrystalline photocells measuring 3x6 inches are used, which can be ordered in online stores such as E-bye.
The cost of photocells is quite high, but many stores sell so-called elements of group B. Products classified in this group are defective, but suitable for use, and their cost is 40-60% lower than that of standard plates.
Most online stores sell photovoltaic cells in sets of 36 or 72 photovoltaic conversion plates. To connect individual modules into a battery, buses will be required, and terminals will be needed to connect to the system.
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A solar battery can be used as a backup energy source during frequent outages of the centralized power supply. For automatic switching it is necessary to provide an uninterruptible power supply system.
Such a system is convenient in that when using a traditional source of electricity, charging is carried out at the same time. The equipment servicing the solar battery is located inside the house, so it is necessary to provide a special room for it.
For decades now, humanity has been searching for alternative energy sources that can at least partially replace existing ones. And the most promising of all today seem to be two: wind and solar energy.
True, neither one nor the other can provide continuous production. This is due to the variability of the wind rose and daily-weather-seasonal fluctuations in the intensity of the solar flux.
Today's energy industry offers three main methods of generating electrical energy, but all of them are harmful to the environment in one way or another:
- Fuel electric power industry- the most environmentally polluting, accompanied by significant emissions of carbon dioxide, soot and useless heat into the atmosphere, causing a reduction in the ozone layer. The extraction of fuel resources for it also causes significant harm to the environment.
- Hydropower is associated with very significant landscape changes, flooding of useful lands, and causes damage to fisheries resources.
- Nuclear power- the most environmentally friendly of the three, but requires very significant costs to maintain safety. Any accident may be associated with causing irreparable, long-term harm to nature. In addition, it requires special measures for the disposal of used fuel waste.
Strictly speaking, get electricity from solar radiation is possible in several ways, but most of them use its intermediate transformation into mechanical, rotating the generator shaft, and only then into electrical.
Such power plants exist, they use Stirling external combustion engines, they have good efficiency, but they also have a significant drawback: in order to collect as much solar radiation energy as possible, it is necessary to manufacture huge parabolic mirrors with systems for tracking the position of the sun.
It must be said that there are solutions to improve the situation, but they are all quite expensive.
There are methods that make it possible direct conversion light energy into electric current. And although the phenomenon of the photoelectric effect in the semiconductor selenium was discovered already in 1876, it was only in 1953, with the invention of the silicon photocell, that real opportunity creating solar panels to generate electricity.
At this time, a theory was already emerging that made it possible to explain the properties of semiconductors and create practical technology their industrial production. TO today this resulted in a real semiconductor revolution.
The operation of a solar battery is based on the phenomenon of semiconductor photoelectric effect p-n junction, which is essentially an ordinary silicon diode. When illuminated, a photovoltage of 0.5~0.55 V appears at its terminals.
When using electric generators and batteries, it is necessary to take into account the differences that exist between. Connecting three phase electric motor into an appropriate network, its output power can be tripled.
Following certain recommendations, with minimal costs in terms of resources and time, it is possible to manufacture the power part of a high-frequency pulse converter for household needs. You can study the structural and circuit diagrams of such power supplies.
Structurally, each element of a solar battery is made in the form of a silicon wafer with an area of several cm2, on which many such photodiodes connected into a single circuit are formed. Each such plate is a separate module that produces a certain voltage and current when exposed to sunlight.
By connecting such modules into a battery and combining their parallel-serial connection, you can get wide range output power values.
The main disadvantages of solar panels:
- Great unevenness and irregularity of energy output depending on the weather and seasonal height of the sun.
- Limits the power of the entire battery if at least one part of it is shaded.
- Dependence on the direction of the sun at different times of the day. For maximum effective use The battery must be ensured that it is always aimed at the sun.
- In connection with the above, the need for energy storage. The greatest energy consumption occurs at a time when its production is minimal.
- Large area required for a structure of sufficient power.
- The fragility of the battery design, the need to constantly clean its surface from dirt, snow, etc.
- Solar modules operate most efficiently at 25°C. During operation, they are heated by the sun to much more high temperature, greatly reducing their effectiveness. To maintain efficiency at optimal level, it is necessary to ensure cooling of the battery.
It should be noted that developments of solar cells using the latest materials and technologies are constantly appearing. This allows you to gradually eliminate the disadvantages inherent in solar panels or reduce their impact. Thus, the efficiency of the latest cells using organic and polymer modules has already reached 35% and there are expectations of reaching 90%, and this makes it possible to obtain much more power with the same battery dimensions, or, while maintaining energy efficiency, to significantly reduce the dimensions of the battery.
By the way, the average efficiency of a car engine does not exceed 35%, which suggests that solar panels are quite effective.There are developments of elements based on nanotechnology that work equally effectively under different angles incident light, which eliminates the need for their positioning.
Thus, today we can talk about the advantages of solar panels compared to other energy sources:
- No mechanical energy conversions or moving parts.
- Minimal operating costs.
- Durability 30~50 years.
- Quiet operation, no harmful emissions. Environmental friendliness.
- Mobility. Battery for powering a laptop and charging the battery for LED flashlight Fits well in a small backpack.
- Independence from the presence of constant current sources. The ability to recharge the batteries of modern gadgets in the field.
- Undemanding to external factors. Solar cells can be placed anywhere, on any landscape, as long as they receive enough sunlight.
In the equatorial regions of the Earth, the average solar energy flux is on average 1.9 kW/m2. IN middle lane In Russia it is within 0.7~1.0 kW/m2. The efficiency of a classic silicon photocell does not exceed 13%.
As experimental data show, if a rectangular plate is directed with its plane to the south, to the point of solar maximum, then over a 12-hour sunny day it will receive no more than 42% of the total luminous flux due to a change in its angle of incidence.
This means that with an average solar flux of 1 kW/m2, 13% Battery efficiency and its total efficiency of 42% can be obtained in 12 hours no more than 1000 x 12 x 0.13 x 0.42 = 622.2 Wh, or 0.6 kWh per day per 1 m 2. This is assuming a full sunny day, in cloudy weather it is much less, and in the winter months this value must be divided by another 3.
Taking into account voltage conversion losses, an automation circuit that provides optimal charging current for batteries and protects them from overcharging, and other elements, the figure of 0.5 kWh/m 2 can be taken as a basis. With this energy, you can maintain a battery charge current of 3 A at a voltage of 13.8 V for 12 hours.
That is, to charge a completely discharged car battery with a capacity of 60 Ah, a solar panel of 2 m2 will be required, and for 50 Ah - approximately 1.5 m2.In order to obtain such power, you can purchase ready-made panels produced in the electrical power range of 10~300 W. For example, one 100 W panel for a 12-hour daylight hours, taking into account the coefficient of 42%, will provide 0.5 kWh.
Such a panel made in China made of monocrystalline silicon with very good characteristics now costs about 6,400 rubles on the market. Less effective in open sun, but having better performance in cloudy weather, polycrystalline - 5,000 rubles.
If you have certain skills in installing and soldering electronic equipment, you can try to assemble such a solar battery yourself. At the same time, you should not count on a very large gain in price; in addition, the finished panels are of factory quality, both the elements themselves and their assembly.
But the sale of such panels is not organized everywhere, and their transportation requires very strict conditions and will be quite expensive. In addition, with self-production, it becomes possible, starting small, to gradually add modules and increase the output power.
Selection of materials for creating a panel
In Chinese online stores, as well as on eBay, it is offered widest choice elements for self-made solar batteries with any parameters.
Even in the recent past, home-made workers purchased plates that were rejected during production, had chips or other defects, but were significantly cheaper. They are quite efficient, but have a slightly reduced power output. Given the constant decline in prices, this is now hardly advisable. After all, losing on average 10% of power, we also lose in the effective panel area. Yes and appearance The battery, consisting of plates with broken pieces, looks quite makeshift.
You can also purchase such modules in Russian online stores, for example, molotok.ru offers polycrystalline elements with operating parameters at a luminous flux of 1.0 kW/m2:
- Voltage: idling - 0.55 V, operating - 0.5 V.
- Current: short circuit - 1.5 A, working - 1.2 A.
- Operating power - 0.62 W.
- Dimensions - 52x77 mm.
- Price 29 rub.
Making a solar battery for your home with your own hands
To make a solar panel, we need a suitable frame, which you can make yourself or pick up a ready-made one. The best material to use for it is duralumin; it is not subject to corrosion, is not afraid of dampness, and is durable. With appropriate processing and painting, both steel and even wood are suitable for protection from precipitation.
Advice: You should not make the panel very large: it will be inconvenient to assemble the elements, install and maintain. In addition, small panels have low windage and can be more conveniently placed at the required angles.We calculate components
Let's decide on the dimensions of our frame. To charge a 12-volt acid battery, you need operating voltage not lower than 13.8 V. Let’s take 15 V as a basis. To do this, we will have to connect 15 V / 0.5 V = 30 elements in series.
Tip: The output of the solar panel should be connected to the battery through a protective diode to prevent it from self-discharging through solar cells at night. So the output of our panel will be: 15 V – 0.7 V = 14.3 V.To obtain a charging current of 3.6 A, we need to connect three such chains in parallel, or 30 x 3 = 90 elements. It will cost us 90 x 29 rubles. = 2610 rub.
Tip: Solar panel elements are connected in parallel and in series. It is necessary to maintain equality in the number of elements in each sequential chain.With this current we can provide a standard charge mode for a completely discharged battery with a capacity of 3.6 x 10 = 36 Ah.
In reality, this figure will be less due to unevenness solar lighting during the day. Thus, to charge a standard 60 Ah car battery, we will need to connect two such panels in parallel.
This panel can provide us with an electrical power of 90 x 0.62 W ≈ 56 W.
Or during a 12-hour sunny day, taking into account correction factor 42% 56 x 12 x 0.42 ≈ 0.28 kWh.
Let's place our elements in 6 rows of 15 pieces. To install all the elements we need a surface:
- Length - 15 x 52 = 780 mm.
- Width - 77 x 6 = 462 mm.
To freely accommodate all the plates, we will take the dimensions of our frame: 900×500 mm.
Tip: If there are ready-made frames with other dimensions, you can recalculate the number of elements in accordance with the outlines given above, select elements of other standard sizes, and try to place them by combining the length and width of the rows.We will also need:
- Electric soldering iron 40 W.
- Solder, rosin.
- Installation wire.
- Silicone sealant.
- Double sided tape.
Manufacturing stages
To install the panel, it is necessary to prepare a level workplace sufficient area with convenient access from all sides. It is better to place the element plates themselves separately to the side, where they will be protected from accidental impacts and falls. They should be taken carefully, one at a time.
Residual current devices improve the safety of your home electrical system by reducing the likelihood of electrical shock and fires. Detailed introduction to characteristic features different types Residual current switches will tell you for apartments and houses.
When using an electric meter, situations arise when it needs to be replaced and reconnected - you can read about this.
Typically, to produce a panel, they use the method of gluing plates of elements pre-soldered into a single circuit onto a flat base-substrate. We offer another option:
- We insert it into the frame, fasten it well and seal the edges with glass or a piece of plexiglass.
- We lay out the element plates on it in the appropriate order, gluing them with double-sided tape: the working side to the glass, the soldering leads to the back side of the frame.
- By placing the frame on the table with the glass down, we can conveniently solder the terminals of the elements. We carry out electrical installation according to the selected circuit diagram inclusions.
- We finally glue the plates on the back side with tape.
- We put some kind of damping pad: sheet rubber, cardboard, fiberboard, etc.
- We insert the back wall into the frame and seal it.
If desired, instead back wall you can fill the frame at the back with some kind of compound, for example, epoxy. True, this will eliminate the possibility of disassembling and repairing the panel.
Of course, one 50 W battery is not enough to provide energy even small house. But with its help it is already possible to implement lighting in it using modern LED lamps.
For a comfortable existence of a city dweller, at least 4 kWh of electricity is now required per day. For a family - according to the number of its members.
Consequently, the solar battery of a private house for a family from three people should provide 12 kWh. If the home is supposed to be supplied with electricity only from solar energy, we will need a solar battery with an area of at least 12 kWh / 0.6 kWh/m2 = 20 m2.
This energy must be stored in batteries with a capacity of 12 kWh / 12 V = 1000 Ah, or approximately 16 batteries of 60 Ah each.
For normal operation of a battery with a solar panel and its protection, a charge controller is required.
To convert 12V direct current at 220 V AC, you will need an inverter. Although now there is already a sufficient quantity of electrical equipment on the market for voltages of 12 or 24 V.
Tip: In low-voltage power supply networks, currents operate at significantly higher values, so when wiring to powerful equipment, you should select a wire of the appropriate cross-section. Wiring for networks with an inverter is carried out according to the usual 220 V circuit.Drawing conclusions
Subject to accumulation and rational use energy, today non-traditional types of electric power are beginning to create a significant increase in the total volume of its production. One could even argue that they are gradually becoming traditional.
Considering the recently significantly reduced level of energy consumption of modern household appliances, the use of energy-saving lighting fixtures and the significantly increased efficiency of solar panels of new technologies, we can say that now they are capable of providing electricity to a small a private house in southern countries with a large number of sunny days a year.
In Russia, they may well be used as backup or additional sources energy in combined systems electricity supply, and if their efficiency can be increased to at least 70%, then it will be quite possible to use them as the main suppliers of electricity.
Video on how to make a device for collecting solar energy yourself
Hello community! This kit was purchased solely for educational and self-development purposes. Below is the assembly process and basic measurements based on the results of balcony tests.
The parcel came with a track and was tracked without problems at every stage. Delivery time is quite standard - 1 month. Packed tightly and conscientiously - not a single part of the kit was damaged. Actually, that's all I got. 
1) Flux pencil. I haven’t used this before, but I wasn’t particularly delighted, although I won’t say a bad word. Basically convenient. The algorithm is simple: grease and solder. When you shake, you can hear a liquid of unknown origin splashing inside, the composition is not indicated! From useful information from the pencil case you can only get a link to the vendor’s website and support e-mail: and [email protected], respectively. Out of curiosity, I took a walk, it didn’t seem to be cheap. 
2) Tire (small 2 mm) for soldering photocells to each other. I didn’t measure the length, but there is a lot of it. After complete assembly of the kit, visually there was as much left as there was. Since the battery in my pocket spectral device ran out :_), the metal from which it was made could not be determined. But the tape is tinned and soldered very easily. 
3) Busbar (large 5 mm) for soldering assemblies of photocells and/or solar panels. Although I know for certain what ohmic losses are, I did not use it; I made the “+” and “-” terminals from a small bus. And even though because of this I will miss 0.000018 W, but honestly I was just lazy) 
4) Well, in fact, the photocells themselves (as many as 42! pcs.) were lovingly rewound by the Chinese in packaging film. 
The geometric dimensions correspond to the declared ones. 
But there were several elements with minor chips. It’s a shame, of course, but the loss of area (read power) is less than 1%, I think. Since when an element is destroyed, the voltage it generates remains the same as that of the whole, it can be mounted in a circuit with (slightly less) success. 
Since the seller stated that at the equator at noon on a cloudless day, each such socket is capable of delivering 0.5 V, it was decided to sequentially assemble 36 elements to generate ≈ 18 V.
“They write on the Internet” that the most convenient platform for assembling such a solar panel is an A4 (photo) frame. Which was purchased in an off-line store at a reasonable price. But let's get back to editing.
The "+" contacts of the photocells are on the back and have different lengths. 
Therefore, I took a piece of a small tire (cut by eye ≈ 1.5 times the width of the module). I tinned it using ordinary rosin (it was somehow inconvenient and unusual to use a flux pencil. I put it aside...) 
After which I applied it in place along the length of the contact and ironed it with a soldering iron. 
The work is quite painstaking, and the material does not like to be rushed at all; I didn’t even expect that these panels were so fragile - almost like eggshell. Therefore, stock up on kvass beer and patience. 
To prevent short circuits, I did the soldering of the “negative” contacts the other way around - I tinned the photocell track and ironed the busbar to it. 
Of course, by the end of the work I had already acquired a certain skill, but neither this nor the six (42-36) element head start saved me from collapse - I broke more solar panels than were available. That's the kind of handyman I am. A cruel joke was also played by the rivets of the photo frame latches, which went right through work surface textolite and, although I had sealed them with electrical tape, they still protruded quite strongly, so much so that they probably damaged a couple of elements; not less. 
However, I was pleasantly surprised by the result. Because even in the absence of direct sunlight
the entire visible horizon was covered with a veil, haze
my solar battery consistently produced 19.7 V
For the use of which, a converter was purchased. which on Idling without hesitation I gave away 5 and a penny volts.
But when connected as a load, the voltage dropped to 3.9 V
But still, a current of 0.14 A was used to charge the phone.
Conclusion: this kit is ideal (all included) for educational and educational purposes, and the device assembled on its basis is quite capable of powering undemanding consumers.
P.S. I will then solder the Schottky diode when I fill it with sealant.
p.p.s. There are really a lot of consumables (tires and flux) left
ppfs test took place on July 6, 2015 at 17:15 hours in the northern hemisphere, at a latitude of approx. 60 degrees N (Leningrad region)
All the best and light)
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