I then passed it from behind the panel through one of the holes and crimped on the fork terminals before attaching them to the terminal block. I constructed a cable with MC4 Connectors on one end to connect to the panel, and fed the other end back into the shed through a hole I had drilled. The mounts allow air to flow under the panel as well as channelling it over the top to reduce the risk of it being torn off in high winds. The panel was bolted to the panel mounts (using M8 bolts) and then bolted to the roof of the shed (again, using M8 bolts) with butterfly nuts to allow for easy removal. The shed is roughly 2.5m long so the 5m LED strip could be cut half way and mounted either side of the centre beam in the roof (and connected at the far end with a small piece of cable run between the two)įor the solar panel, luckily the shed faces north / south so one half of the roof was south-facing and therefore perfect for maximum exposure of sunlight. The output cable from the controller is passed through a hole to the rear of the board and then run out again above the fuse box.įrom there I wired the switch (there was a reason for a 2-gang switch which I will go into later in the instructable) and ran the cable that would connect to the LED Strip and finally tacked it all in place. Terminal blocks were placed in proximity to their controller terminals and the 'output' side of the distribution board situated to the right hand side. I drilled several holes in the board to allow me to run and feed the cable in from behind rather than cluttering up the front. I cut the sheet about 15mm wider than the controller and rounded the corners (just for aesthetics), marked and drilled the four holes and then screwed it in behind the controller.
I first considered 'stepping' it away from the plywood therefore giving it an air-gap between the rear of the controller and the wood but finally decided to mount it onto a aluminium plate to help dissipate the heat. The controller itself came with a warning stating that the rear was actually a heat-sink and this should be considered when mounting. I chose to use a sheet of 10mm Plywood on which I laid out the controller, connection terminal blocks, fuse and fuse box. I decided I wanted to mount most of the main components on a distribution board which could constructed and then be simply installed and connected in the shed. I'm sure if you shop around some more on eBay most of the components could probably be found cheaper as well.įor me, the fun part of this project was always going to be the build. This cost can be reduced significantly if you chose a lower wattage panel & smaller battery capacity. Panel Connectors: Generic MC4 Connectors - £5.50 Terminal Block: 4-Row Terminal Strip - £5.50
Solar Panel: 100w Pollycrystalline PV Panel - £70.00īattery: 12v 35Ah Leisure Battery - £50.00įuse Box: 4-Way Automotive Fuse Box - £6.00īattery Lead: Ring Terminals, inline fuse and 'Anderson' connector - £5.00 MPPT Controller: eSky Intellegent LCD 30A - £20.00 With all that in mind, I opted for the PWM model and set about buying the other components I needed. PWM has been around a lot longer than the MPPT technology and as a result is generally cheaper and are available in a greater selection of sizes and models. In comparison, the MPPT (Maximum Power Point Tracking) charge controller is far better at optimising the output from the solar array and can deal with the solar array generating excess voltage which can be harnessed and used to improve charging efficiency by 20%-25% (under the right conditions). The first, PWM (Pulse Width Modulation) is better suited to low power applications (< 170W) however it is not capable of dealing with any over voltage generated by the solar array. There are two main types of controller PWM and the MPPT Controller. This unit is able to regulate the flow of current to the battery and therefore prevent overcharging and also prevents the load from draining the battery too far which also causes damage. To prevent this you use a Solar Charge Controller, a device which sits between the solar panel and the battery.
however this all goes very badly when the battery is fully charged and you will actually damage the battery if you push anymore current into it. You can hook a solar panel straight up to a battery and charge it. For those of you who are unfamiliar with the components of a solar charging system, it goes something like this:
SOLAR LANDSCAPE LIGHTING SYSTEMS HOW TO
I had no knowledge of how to put one of these together and so it took a few days before I felt I'd learnt enough to know what I was doing. I Googled a lot before I went any further.
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