Semi-flexible solar panel install

[fryedaze]

Hmmm. Sure wish I'd have taken a look at those when you were here, Dave. Sun exposure and plastics aren't exactly friends, but I sure figured the materials to be more tested-durable than that. You've been here in So. Florida for a while now. What are you getting out of them?

Hi Larry, the brittleness may be a none issue. I torqued the panel beyond the 30 degree spec that it has to get it to crack. My only point was that they were much less flexible. The good thing is that the poly layer on the cells is not yellowing or changing color as you can see in the pics. I got 225 watts at 1300 today. That probably 180 watts out of the good panels and 45 out of the degraded one. Hope everyone is breathing better in Longboat.

 

[BruceK]

Dave, my conventional panels are 5 years old, still ok, Chinese made, from Ebay. They have over an 1" of airspace under. There has to be a reduced heat dissipation when they are mounted flat on another surface, even if it is canvas.
The solar panel not made in China is probably increasingly rare.

 

[fryedaze]

Here is a link to Solbian Solar. They are an Italian company. Lots on info, videos, installation manual etc. These are the semi-flexible panels I have seen at boat shows. They look like the panels I installed. At the bottom of the install page there are links to blogs with install documented.
INSTALLATION EXAMPLES

 

[fryedaze]

Cell cracks and heat buildup

Here is an article from Coastal Climate Control the may explain my burnt cell. The picture in the article looks like the burn spot on mine.
Cracked solar cells and heat damage

 

[Hickers]

Great thread, my three cheap 120 watt flexible solar panels mounted on a rigid fly bridge roof are not producing any amps. Electrician due Monday to try and isolate the problem. I went with flex panels to keep the weight down but if they need replacing I think glass will be the answer.

 

[JDCAVE]

My neighbour just went with a pretty expensive install: 300 watts of flexible panels, with a Morningstar MPPT controller. It was a full service marine electrical outfit that did the install. He mentioned he was only getting an output of 40 watts (yes, he said watts) yesterday, which was fully sunny here although it's Spring. He seemed pretty disappointed. Something's wrong, I think.


Jim
Sent from my iPad using Trawler Forum

 

[twistedtree]

You guys are doing a great service for the rest of us by pioneering use of these flex panels. I only wish you were having more success.

 

[fryedaze]

You guys are doing a great service for the rest of us by pioneering use of these flex panels. I only wish you were having more success.

We will keep hammering away at this until we either get a good reliable result or figure out that the product isn't suitable for the application. I am a patient man.

 

[healhustler]

If we keep going like this, the only successful solar effort will end up Janice, who has collected some older, lower power panels to throw up on her Pilothouse roof. She's happy.

 

[JDCAVE]

You guys are doing a great service for the rest of us by pioneering use of these flex panels. I only wish you were having more success.

I believe neighbour's panels were hugely expensive. I'm gonna say $600-800 Cdn/100 watt panel? Something like that. He seemed quite disappointed. I'd a been some kinda pissed.


Jim
Sent from my iPad using Trawler Forum

 

[fryedaze]

My neighbour just went with a pretty expensive install: 300 watts of flexible panels, with a Morningstar MPPT controller. It was a full service marine electrical outfit that did the install. He mentioned he was only getting an output of 40 watts (yes, he said watts) yesterday, which was fully sunny here although it's Spring. He seemed pretty disappointed. Something's wrong, I think.


Jim
Sent from my iPad using Trawler Forum

Does he understand that if the batts are fully charged the solar panel controller will not put out any more that absorption or float volts. 40 watts would be normal for charge batts with no load or a battery charger in parallel

 

[fryedaze]

Great thread, my three cheap 120 watt flexible solar panels mounted on a rigid fly bridge roof are not producing any amps. Electrician due Monday to try and isolate the problem. I went with flex panels to keep the weight down but if they need replacing I think glass will be the answer.

Let us know what it is.

 

[twistedtree]

If we keep going like this, the only successful solar effort will end up Janice, who has collected some older, lower power panels to throw up on her Pilothouse roof. She's happy.

Hey,mine are working fine too They are rigid but cost about $1/watt and work great.

 

[healhustler]

My Amigos on a Krogen 39 have pretty close to 10 K invested in a 600 watt system that the glued on their pilothouse roof, supposedly you can dance on these. So far so good but that's big bucks for 600 watts.

 

[JDCAVE]

Does he understand that if the batts are fully charged the solar panel controller will not put out any more that absorption or float volts. 40 watts would be normal for charge batts with no load or a battery charger in parallel

Of course. I didn't ask him what the state of charge was. I was just reporting what he said.


Jim
Sent from my iPad using Trawler Forum

 

[FlyWright]

We will keep hammering away at this until we either get a good reliable result or figure out that the product isn't suitable for the application. I am a patient man.

I love the fact that you're giving this to us just as it happens. Unpolished. I'm very interested in the idea of reliable flexible panels on a canvas frame base...

Hey,mine are working fine too They are rigid but cost about $1/watt and work great.

...but if flexible doesn't quite cut it yet, I'll have what he's having.

 

[psneeld]

Renology Solar just put out a recall on Semi flexible 100 watt panels. Fire hazard.

May want to check your brand....I have rigid Renology panels and I hadn't heard of a recall until I saw a flyer on a marina clubhouse door.

 

[Hickers]

Two of my three 120 watt flex panels were totally dead meaning no output at all. Going glass with a single 345 watt panel, no trust in flexible panels now.

 

[healhustler]

Hickers: Mind if I ask who's panel you're going with? Price? How big is the panel? Thanks for any info.

 

[Hickers]

Sun-power X 21, 57 volts, long warranty, salt resistant and about 1.6 m X 1.1 m , weighs 18kg. Having one big panel reduces the number of connections too! Don't know price yet, was a bit beyond caring!

 

[BruceK]

Sorry you, and anyone else, are having issues with flexible panels. You should be fine with conventional versions. Seems it`s an area not be an early adopter, as Australians so often are, of new technology.

 

[Peter B]

FWIW I have had a great run out of a line called Unipolar flexible panels, and even now, after about 8 years, they still put out 17+volts in good light, however they are only 30W panels, so strictly trickle charge types, but they certainly keep the start batt right up there at 13.5v and add to the Airbreeze wind gen. and engine running for the house batts.
Being relatively low power outputs I just use Sunguard PWM type solar controllers on them. Didn't seem worth a more expensive MPPT type.

https://www.solaronline.com.au/uni-solar-pvl-64-64w-flexible-amorphous-thin-film-solar-panel.html

http://www.solarpoweraustralia.com.au/why-we-use-unisolar.html

http://www.goingsolar.com.au/what-we-do/brands-and-products/uni-solar-flexible-thin-film-solar-panel

 

[fryedaze]

Renology Solar just put out a recall on Semi flexible 100 watt panels. Fire hazard.

May want to check your brand....I have rigid Renology panels and I hadn't heard of a recall until I saw a flyer on a marina clubhouse door.

psneeld, thanks for the info. I did some research and found a sailboat blog that captured his discussion about the recall with Renology. It appears that a specific series of panels sold had cracks in the cells. The crack causes localized hot spots. I have been checking my panels the last two days during peak sun and no wind conditions. At 250-275 watts the top of the panels are 115-125F and the bottoms are 105-110F.

The localized failure that I had posted previously actually bubbled the plexiglass in a small area under the failed cell. I will be inspecting the panels frequently. I wish I could find more info an the potential fire or fires that resulted in the recall.

 

[twistedtree]

Unisolar has been around for a long time and was the first big commercial flex panel supplier, but I'm pretty sure they went out of business a long time ago. The down side of that technology is that it's much lower power per square foot that for rigid panel technology. On a house it typically isn't a big concern because you have plenty of roof space, so you just take up a little bit more to get the desired amount of power. On a boat, flex panels can be the difference between panels or no panels, so if they are the only thing that works, they are better than nothing. But roof space is usually the constraining factor on a boat, so in a perfect world you would want the max number of watts per sq foot, which would draw you to rigid panels. But I'll be the first to admit they aren't always suitable.

Just out of curiosity for those who have installed flex panels, what was the driving motivation for flex? Was it weight? Ease of installation? Irregular surface?

Weight-wise, are they really that much lighter than rigid panels?

Here's a quick comparison that might answer my own questions:

Looking at PowerFilmSolar as an example, they have a 60W flex panel. It is 15W/lb, and 37 sq in/watt.

Compart that to a Kyocera 250W rigid panel which is 5.6W/lb, and 10 sq in/Watt

So the rigid panels are about 3x the weight per watt, but you can get almost 4x the power per sq ft of roof space.

 

[fryedaze]

Just out of curiosity for those who have installed flex panels, what was the driving motivation for flex? Was it weight? Ease of installation? Irregular surface?

Weight-wise, are they really that much lighter than rigid panels?

Here's a quick comparison that might answer my own questions:

Looking at PowerFilmSolar as an example, they have a 60W flex panel. It is 15W/lb, and 37 sq in/watt.

Compart that to a Kyocera 250W rigid panel which is 5.6W/lb, and 10 sq in/Watt

So the rigid panels are about 3x the weight per watt, but you can get almost 4x the power per sq ft of roof space.

My drivers were cost and ease of installation. I have no place to install solid panels with out a lot of frame work fabrication. We could have put hinged panels on the hand rails but wouldn't have liked the look. Framing over the bimini would have been pricey and the extra weight may have been a problem, not to mention the wind load.


Dimensions: (51¾ x 26½" x 1/16") Weight: About 7 lbs. 150 watts. 21 watts/lb, 9 sqin/watt

 

[twistedtree]

My drivers were cost and ease of installation. I have no place to install solid panels with out a lot of frame work fabrication. We could have put hinged panels on the hand rails but wouldn't have liked the look. Framing over the bimini would have been pricey and the extra weight may have been a problem, not to mention the wind load.


Dimensions: (51¾ x 26½" x 1/16") Weight: About 7 lbs. 150 watts. 21 watts/lb, 9 sqin/watt

That's a good bit better performance than the example panel I dredged up.

 

[Peter B]

I'm so impressed with solar now, (as we have it at home now as well, saving a bomb in power bills. See pic.), if we were keeping the boat much longer, and as we hardly ever use the flybridge helm, I would add extra panels up there except for a narrow walkway between them for the odd time we do want to use it, and then just make it off-limits for if we had friends out with us. Even now, the couple of modest panels on a 'safe' area of the aft part of the top deck have made a big contribution...second pic.

 

[Hickers]

My flexible solar panels are in the dumpster replaced by two 345 watt panels running through a victron mppt controller. Our results on anchor depend a bit on wind direction as the sat dome and radar shade the panels. Best day 2.64 kW, peak Amps 36 with voltages around 55. All very professionally installed by Jim from Odessey. Havent got the bill yet but workmanship and attention to detail was refreshing.

 

[Hickers]

When not shaded we have consistently seen 50 amps from the solar panels, they have cut our genset run time by an hour a day and mean our 780 ah house bank is at full charge by late afternoon in spite of running 3 fridges, a freezer , inverter etc. Better still if we lose shore power when away from the boat our solar panels keep the batteries charged and run the kitchen fridge.

 

[Hickers]

Loving these sunpower panels!! 3.37kw today. They have recharged the house bank and run the boat all day which consumes about 20 amps per hour.