I have a very simple and easy tilt setup for my 3 x home panels, if you are at the RTR you can take a look at them. I use giant cotter keys so it only takes a moment to lock/unlock them in place. I tilt/untilt my panels often, there is a definite 30-50% power increase in having them tilted depending on the time of year (winter, like right now, is huge), plus most importantly is the ability to get the last 2 hours of sunlight which a flat panel wont do, that is 2 hours less your batteries have to work overnight.
I am using an angle aluminum frame and boxed aluminum support rods. Because my system is huge the materials cost me about $200.
On the partial shading of panels question, it hasn't been a problem for me, I rarely park anywhere with shading, and if I do park under shade I use a portable 160 watt panel.
Partial shading, such as one entire square on the panel, DOES make a fairly large drop in power output, I have many different panels and they ALL are disproportionately affected by partial shading. Once you get to about a hand size worth of shading or more the performance of panels does start dropping rapidly when pulling full amperage from them. The key is to either minimize partial shading or overbuild the system some to compensate for it. If I was planning to park under a lot of partially shaded areas I would have one set of panels at the front of the rig and another at the very back on two separate controllers and/or have a nice external panel set up.
I speak from experience, I have both types of Renogy, LG, Cynergy, and some other no name poly and mono crystalline brands. I have the ability to monitor my panels from both built in software and a calibrated volts/amps Fluke multimeter, I also have an electronics degree and have run as the Flight Chief a couple of metrology laboratories (Precision Measuring Equipment Calibration and Repair) for the United States Air Force. Renogy Eclipse just use a higher quality monocrystalline cell (18.35%, which isn't that great compared to the newest cells out there now which are around 21%+) so they omit an entire row of cells vs standard Renogy panels, that's why they are smaller in footprint to their standard panel. The Eclipse panels are affected by shading just the same as their cheaper panel.
This is not a forum for attacking people so please refrain, I saw an earlier post where someone got attacked for stating about the same as I just did, please don't get stuck in the "my equipment is better" mindset and be open to others opinions/facts.
Shade Losses in PV Systems, and Techniques to Mitigate ThemHere is an excellent blog on partial shading that describes it in detail and addresses bypass diodes. It is an easy read and if you are interested in solar I highly recommend you take a moment to read it. One interesting quote from it that explains diodes is
"Although it would be theoretically ideal to have a bypass diode for each solar cell, for cost reasons a typical solar module will have three bypass diodes, effectively grouping the cells into three series cell strings (Figure 5). For instance, a 60-cell module will typically have one bypass diode for every 20 cells."This means for most panels with bypass diodes, shading of a small portion can take out 1/3 of the power output .
