FIND OUT THE CHARGING CURRENT OF THE SOLAR PANEL 100WP

By: Yohan Indrawijaya

What the rate of charging current of 12Volt 100WP Solar Panel?

SUBJECT ISSUE OF SOLAR PANEL

I am a person with an interested in new thing. Include a Solar Panel..

Friends said that the Solar panel 100WP can handle the load of whole electrical lamp in your home. I think he is never bought the solar panel and apply it in his home.

That why i decide to have my own solar power

Really? Its looks like an interested matter.

After the rupiah was collected, so I get started to purchased one by one, step by step to realized the project: Electrical Generating Power by Solar Panel.

DOES IT SAFE TO PURCHASED THE SOLAR PANEL VIA ONLINE? DOES ITS RISKY?

All the component here using the online store. In my country, the online shopping ( olshop ) is demand. Anybody need to shopping online. Me too.

I use the bukalapak.com to purchased all the item of this project. I said here Alhamdulillah. Thanks God. Nothing trouble using the online shop application.

It’s just that package costs are making me feel disturbing. One item need one packing cost. But it is worth what I got

EQUIPMENT REQUIRED

After take a some deeper learning, so I decide to purchased some the component:

• Solar Panel 100Watt Peak. The unit work as a Sun Cathcer. They absorb the intensity of Ray to convert it to be an electric.

• Solar Controller 10Ampere. The unit works as charge control . Its can be stop and start to Charge between DC battery and Solar Panel. The question: Why must you choose the 10A unit? Its because you running in only one solar module. In the name plate said that the maximum output current is 6,7Amp. So I think this is good enough to using the 10Amp controller. As you know, this peak current was not a continues signal. The module will transfer a big enough electricity when the sun so brightly.

• Battery 12Volt 40AH. The unit works provide electric current . With the 100WP Solar panel, its good to use the half of number. If you use 100WP, its better you use the 50AH battery. In this case, I purchased the battery 40AH only. Budget is the reason. 40 AH is the type of Power Providing of the battery when its can supplying 40 DC Ampere for countinue within 1 hour only. It mean, if you using the battery with current flow 1Amp, The electrical current of the battery will end in 40 Hours.

• Inverter 1000Watt Modified Sine Wave. The unit works as current converter. Its can provide convert a DC 12V current to a AC 220Volt current. The reason for me to purchased the unit is: Budget. If you have an higher budget, its better to purchased the Power Inverter with Sine wave output. This is good for the electrical load, but its so expensive in price.

TESTING A DC ACCUMULATOR

This time i try to purchased an 12Volt DC Battery with 40AH rating capacity. Hmm why you choose this? Yeah. Its because a 100WP Solar Panel ideally using a half of number of it. If you get 100WP, its better to choose a 50AH DC Battery.

So why must to choose the Brand is GS one? its just a coincident. While there is a budget. Then i decide to purchased the used an 40AH battery.

When I purchased the battery, its can make a heavy sparks when i try to test its with shorting small cable. Do not try this if you are a junior in this lesson.

Q: HOW BIG THE INLET VOLTAGE TO SOLAR CONTROLLER

CAUTION: Always install the DC Battery in first to Solar Controller. The wrong step causes some trouble and damage,

The first step is I connect the cable between DC Battery and the Solar Controller. The load terminal is not used.

The second step is to connect the cable between Solar Panel to Solar Charge Controller. Do not invert the polarity. It can be damaged the unit.

When the cable was connected, the number of voltage shown. The unit show the number 14.4V. Its mean The Solar controller read the Voltage from Solar Panel in the Outdoor with this voltage value.

Q: HOW MUCH ELECTRICAL CURRENT TO CHARGING SOLAR CONTROLLER?

After the cable wiring was complete, now we see how much the DC current to charge the battery. I use the Fluke 325 Clamp meter to measure the cable. NOTE: Use only single cable. do not measure two cable in one clamp. It cause error reading or wrong measuring.

When I clamping the cable, it shown the number 2.88 A. The weather is heat and the sun shining very brightly. I think this is a rate number of ampere charging.

Name plate said that the solar panel can provide the maximum current 6.7 Amp. I don’t think this is not a good idea. The maximum charging current ampere is not the rating charging current!

HOW BIG THE VOLTAGE AND DC CURRENT SEND TO BATTERY?

Now I need to know what big number of voltage when it charge the battery. Controller said its 13.7 Volt DC. The normal number of charging voltage.

After know the voltage. I need to know How much the DC current charging to the Battery? The answer is 2.74A. It’s smaller than the input charging to Solar Controller

If the battery capacity is 40AH, its need to charge 40AH/2.74A = 14 Hours to full charge the battery. If the sun shine within 07 O’clock to 16 O’clock, its mean there are nine hours the charging time. The battery can not be full charge at the afternoon.

The theory said that only 9/14 hours to full charge or 64 % full charge. I think this is not bad to supplying the little load as big as 25 Watts in 12 hours ( 6 PM to 6 AM).