Also keep in mind that solar panels experience a 75 90 drop in efficiency on cloudy days so it s good to have slightly more than you need when it comes to solar power about a 20 cushion if possible to account for less than ideal conditions.
How many watt solar panel do i need camping.
Now as i said before this is a high power example more typical of a large offgrid caravan or motorhome but the approach is the same.
For any given energy production target you need fewer panels if their individual wattage is higher.
But i have seen plenty of 160 watt panels.
100 watt portable solar panel.
But there are many reasons why you wouldn t want to do this.
A 300 amp hour camper battery for instance would need around 300 watts of solar power.
100 watt solar panel approximately 6 amps hour in direct summer sun no clouds here s an example of our calculation of how much the solar panels are generating to recharge our rv batteries.
And that output can vary a lot by size and type of panel.
The spreadsheet looks complicated but in reality it is very simple to use.
Now i ve not seen a 133 watt solar panel for sale.
5 hours of direct sunlight x 6 amps generated hour 30 amp hours day.
Divide both sides by 30 and you need 1 33 100 watt solar panels.
Start off with 100 watts.
The renogy 50 watt flexiblemonocrystalline solar panel is an excellent choice for boats rv or camping purposes.
How to choose a panel.
Just substitute your loads and perform the same calculation.
So from our camping experiment we ve determined that a 160 watt panel will keep our batteries topped off most days and that kit fits the bill.
This is also assuming of course you have a lot of battery power too.
To build a system that size using 100 watt solar panels would require networking 50 to 100 of them together.
I ve attached the solar calculator mk ii here that you can use to determine how much battery and solar capacity you will need to meet your free camping needs.
Flexible solar panels have an amazing advantage on curved surfaces where traditional modules would represent problems due to the fixed mounting structure.
Calculate your solar panel needs solar panels are usually rated to put out 150 to 370 watts.
Plus that s the output you can expect with direct sunlight.
Homes use a lot of energy and they generally require a solar system sized between 5 kw and 10 kw that s 5 000 10 000 watts.
This is assuming you are considering using 12 volt rv grade panels.
To work out the size of the panel we need we simply take the 28 45 x 18v average voltage of a solar panel 512w.
We suggest a battery bank of 800 amp hours.
Panel specifications the power rating of panels varies depending on the model and manufacturer but most range from 250 watts to 330 watts.
You will need at least 1 800 watts of solar panels to run your rv air conditioner.