A 30 watt solar panel for my 22

Bill1565 · Mar 27, 2015

lpolliard said:
I want to add a solar panel to charge up my battery. Below is a question I asked of a local solar panel company out in Chino, CA, Renogy. Their 100 watt panel had a decent performance review against the WindyNation panel, both sold on Amazon. I read Kyocera makes the best panel but unfortunately the smallest panel they make is 140 watts and it is physically huge, so are the 100 watt panels. Anyone ever used a Renogy 30 watt panel before? ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I want to put your Renogy 30W 12V Monocrystalline Solar Panel on my Catalina 22 sailboat. My overall onboard power usage is fairly minimal. There are a few in-cabin lights for night time illumination, running lights when motoring in the dark and an anchor light that would be on all night when the boat is in use. These are all LED, 3 watts/hr each. Also I would be recharging a couple of iPhones, 5 to 10 watts each. The biggest draw would be the Raymarine ST2000 tiller pilot with a power consumption of 40 mA used during sailing or motoring. The 40 mA spec seems a bit low, http://www.raymarine.com/view/?id=748 . The watts per hour draw on this device is unknown but is said to be low. Would the calculation be 40 mA x 12V? My power system is a single deep cycle marine 12V battery. I am not sure how many amp hours it is rated. I see they can range from 50 to 150 amp hours. Let’s say my battery is rated at 100 amp hours. I believe my daily usage would be less than the 150 watts your panel would produce on a normal day. The above is just back ground information. My question is simply, given my battery is 100 amp hours and is at 75% and there is no draw but the normal discharge a battery loses over time, how many days would it take your panel to fully charge my battery if I am getting 150 watts per day out of your panel? 5 hours of SoCal sun @ 30 watts per hour, 150 watts per day. Also, I plan to add an outboard motor with a 12V charging alternator at 60W and 5A. How do I connect it to my system so I get the benefit of your solar panel as well as the charge from the motor? Thanks for your help in this matter, ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The answer I got back was 2 days from one tech and 3 days from a second which is acceptable. So a completely drained battery could be charged up in a week. With regards to hooking up the alternator I was told to connect directly to the battery both alternator and solar panel controller. The controller will detect when the alternator is running and adjust appropriately. Sounds like I won't be getting the full 90 watts out of the sum of both systems. Any thoughts on this?

Save your money. Buy a " smart charger" plug your boat in at the dock or at home. Potent solar panels also require controllers about the same cost to reduce the voltage to 14 +. This doubles your investment.

Stu Jackson · Mar 27, 2015

lpolliard said:
Plugging in is not an option. I dry store my boat (mast up) at the marina and there is no outlet. I could pull the battery and charge it at home but hard to find an outlet if anchored for a week off Catalina. I figure I will be in for $150 on this project. Controllers are not so expensive, under $20. The mounting hardware is where they get you. Almost as expensive as the panel, $50.

In lieu of reinventing the wheel, I recommend that you do a search on this forum (upper right SEARCH tab) on

Renogy

MPPT (for controllers)

There have been many discussion about this very subject and a few of the results you get will answer all your questions.

https://svsmitty.wordpress.com/ just installed a Renogy panel, read away.

Good luck, good idea.

CaptDon01 · Mar 27, 2015

Here are some photos of the solar charger I made for our C-22. Simply attaches to the stern pulpit, no tools required. Keeps both my group-27 batteries topped off while the boat sits in the storage yard. I installed the same plug used for the outboard battery charger, so I simply unscrew the motor charger cord, and plug in the solar charger. The controller is mounted underneath with 3M5200. It's portable, so we also used it when on the mooring at Catalina Island to ensure the battery bank is topped off. The last photo shows us on the mooring in Avalon Harbor with the solar charger on the stern pulpit.

Don't know how much our Raymarine ST2000 draws, the amount they quote I believe is while it's sitting idle. No real way for them to say how much it draws because it naturally depends on the load. A C-22 isn't going to be much, I don't know how much, but I can tell you that one of our Group-27 batteries powered the autopilot, the VHF, the GPS, and phone chargers, ipad charger and running lights,(converted to LED's), continuously for over 18 hours coming down the coast from Long Beach, and never ran out of power, and still had the second battery available, which we never used.

Coast Guard regulations don't require our C-22's,(length requirements), to have an anchor light, unless you intend to anchor overnight in a navigable channel,(that's the simplified version). Since I never have, and don't intend to, I've removed my masthead light so I could install my VHF antenna and wind-ex. Guess I like living on the wild side.

I guess someone smarter than me could figure it all out, but nothing like practical experience.

Lot's of ways to skin a cat, but it's just what works for us.....

Don

P.S. Hey Leroy, just noticed our "New Design" C-22 is just 100 boats newer than yours, our 1988 is #14377,(but your's is prettier)

$tingy Sailor · Mar 27, 2015

Before you spend hundreds on a solar charging setup, look at what it would take to add a charging circuit to your outboard motor.

My Yamaha already had the coils in it so I only needed to add a rectifier/regulator for $70 and now we get 3-5 amps charging every time I run the motor. It's an easy DIY project. Motoring in and out of the marina, anchoring, and putting around in still air is enough to keep our battery at full charge for days on end while running all our LED lights and electronics.

Unlike a solar panel, an outboard motor charge is predictable, consistent, useful on cloudy days or at night, simpler to install, adds less weight, and is almost invisible on deck.

Unless I were offshore for days on end or left the boat unattended for months on end, I can't imagine why I'd want a solar charger. Your mileage may vary.

CaptDon01 · Mar 27, 2015

Unfortunately, 4-6 HP Tohatsu's,(they also make the small Nissan and Mercury's), will require a charging kit. Everything is ready to go, just need to pop the flywheel off and install the charging coil next to the ignition coil, and install the rectifier. 5 HP Honda's kit includes a new flywheel. The ignition coil and magnet is on the outside of the flywheel. The kit includes two charging coils that are mounted inside the new flywheel, which now has magnets on the inside for the charger, and the magnet on the outside for the ignition coil. Either one is pretty fool proof to install, pink wire goes to pink wire, yellow wire goes to yellow wire, etc... The

C-22 MainBrace had articles on the installations several years ago that I wrote.

Don

CaptDon01 · Mar 27, 2015

Steal away Leroy....yeah, I never was much on math,

I don't remember the manufacture of the parts. I'll look it up for you next time I'm at the boat, probably tomorrow when I take the motorhome back to the storage lot. Yes, the same plug is used for the outboard charger, and the solar panel. Simply unplug one, and plug in the other.

Here's some photos from another solar charger I made when we had our Capri-18. It's a lot cheaper to make, parts available from Home Depot plumbing department, and the solar charger is from Harbor Freight. I think it's like maybe $30. It's very simple, no controller is required because the output is is very low, (mA's), so if someone helped themselves to it, you're not out much money. But it keeps the battery fresh, and topped off sitting in the storage yard if I didn't use the boat for a few weeks. It simply plugged into a 12V receptacle in the boat. Cheap as it was, it still had a diode so it wouldn't discharge the battery at night.

Just another alternative....

Don

Brian D · Mar 27, 2015

lpolliard, I use a 50 watt Renogy panel on my Lancer. It is connect to an MPPT controller and directly to my house bank. My starter charger is connected to dock power. I understand you will not have access to dock power.

I am not sure what you will be running during the day/night, but make sure what ever power you consume it is replaced with the panel during the peak 4 hour period from 10 to 2. If the boat is not moving you can adjust the panel for direct sunlight, or put it flat on the boat if the boat is swinging on a mooring.

The 50 watts gives me about 2.9ah and I can get a good 4 hours winter and 6 hours summer of sunlight.

Brian D · Mar 27, 2015

Well, I think you have to create a budget for your power needs. While on the water, the panel works great and allows me to run one vhf, one autopilot, two gps (one for the vhf and one for the autopilot), and my depth sounder and still keep the battery topped off for when I drop hook. So 50 watts I think was the the correct choice based on my needs at the time.

allen-deckard · Mar 28, 2015

I've got a 30watt panel and 2 good size batteries that I've put in the bow of the boat.

On that panel I run my
autopilot
radio
lights
chartplotter/sonar

The batteries stay fully charged

I got my panel at west marine. Only thing you have to make sure whatever panel you get has is the diode. Without the diode the panel will run backwards at night and discharge your batteries.

Don't oversize your panel either if it's to large you run the risk of overcharging your battery/batteries

Gene Neill · Mar 28, 2015

I installed this 60 watter from Harbor Freight. The PVC frame articulates about 40 degrees port and starboard to allow for better tracking.

I'm still a little disappointed in its output though. As crazy as it sounds, I guess you get what you pay for.

trainmanjess · Mar 28, 2015

hello all

I use a Renogy 30 watt panel on my Kittiwake 23ft sailboat.... it powers the cabin lights, navigation lights, hummingbird depth/fish finder, and the am/fm/cd radio.... it keeps the battery topped off, and I use very little battery power during the day... mostly I use the power from the solar panel most days... I can use all the electrical items for a few hours at night and then when I go to sleep, the anchor light is powered all night.... it takes care of all my needs.... I have a 2 battery bank on my boat....

I mounted the solar panel to the top of the forward hatch over the V-birth...

sincerely
Jess

CaptDon01 · Mar 28, 2015

Gene Neill said:
I installed this 60 watter from Harbor Freight. The PVC frame articulates about 40 degrees port and starboard to allow for better tracking.

I'm still a little disappointed in its output though. As crazy as it sounds, I guess you get what you pay for.

Where do you keep your boat? I want to steal those hatch boards!