silentC
30th June 2008, 04:59 PM
I guess the sensible place for this question is on the renovation forum, but since I don't go there....
I recently picked up a couple of boxes of those solar powered garden lights. Each of the lights has a small solar cell and a 1.5v AA rechargeable battery. There's a photovoltaic cell that is used to turn them on and off. The light source is an LED.
I've found that in the winter months, they don't really get enough sunlight to charge the batteries, so some nights they only go for a couple of hours before the batteries are flat. I don't think the tiny solar panels on each is very efficient at collecting sun light, plus being low to the ground, they are often in shadow, which shortens the exposure.
What I was thinking of doing was getting a 12v solar panel and a decent battery (I can get some 6v wet cells from my Uncle) and seeing if I can't boost it a bit.
I had a couple of ideas - one would be to run a wire in series to each light connected to the new battery and do away with the little AA cells altogether. I figure groups of 8 lights in series would be OK on a 12v circuit (two 6v batteries in series).
The other idea was to see if it's possible to get the AAs recharging off the 12v panel, which I would put up high and face north. I wasn't sure how to wire this up, but again I guess 8 in series would be the go.
Anybody got any ideas on the above?
I recently picked up a couple of boxes of those solar powered garden lights. Each of the lights has a small solar cell and a 1.5v AA rechargeable battery. There's a photovoltaic cell that is used to turn them on and off. The light source is an LED.
I've found that in the winter months, they don't really get enough sunlight to charge the batteries, so some nights they only go for a couple of hours before the batteries are flat. I don't think the tiny solar panels on each is very efficient at collecting sun light, plus being low to the ground, they are often in shadow, which shortens the exposure.
What I was thinking of doing was getting a 12v solar panel and a decent battery (I can get some 6v wet cells from my Uncle) and seeing if I can't boost it a bit.
I had a couple of ideas - one would be to run a wire in series to each light connected to the new battery and do away with the little AA cells altogether. I figure groups of 8 lights in series would be OK on a 12v circuit (two 6v batteries in series).
The other idea was to see if it's possible to get the AAs recharging off the 12v panel, which I would put up high and face north. I wasn't sure how to wire this up, but again I guess 8 in series would be the go.
Anybody got any ideas on the above?