Technical Q&A For Renogy Solar Products

[Renogy]

If you have a question for our team, please feel free to ask us here, or send us a private message. We'll do our best to answer your question to the best of our abilities as quickly as we can.

Please note, we do encourage you to contact our technical support department directly at 1-800-330-8678, by email at [email protected], or via the chat function on our website at renogy-store.com if you need a more immediate response.

Thank you,
The Renogy Team

 

[ttpadilla]

Yay, I have two questions!

1) Should I be disconnecting my solar panel at sundown, and reconnecting the next morning, or is it okay to leave it connected 24/7?
2) Pardon me, but my wattage vs voltage vs amp hours ignorance will be glaringly obvious here. My two 12v 80 Ah batteries are super weak, and I will be replacing them tomorrow. The plan is to replace them with two 6v 230 Ah batteries. Will the 100w Suitcase solar panel be sufficient to keep the new batteries charged, or will I require additional panels, considering my panel is putting out about 5.8 amps per hour, for about 6 hours a day?

 

[Renogy]

Yay, I have two questions!  

1) Should I be disconnecting my solar panel at sundown, and reconnecting the next morning, or is it okay to leave it connected 24/7?
2) Pardon me, but my wattage vs voltage vs amp hours ignorance will be glaringly obvious here.  My two 12v 80 Ah batteries are super weak, and I will be replacing them tomorrow.  The plan is to replace them with two 6v 230 Ah batteries. Will the 100w Suitcase solar panel be sufficient to keep the new batteries charged, or will I require additional panels, considering my panel is putting out about 5.8 amps per hour, for about 6 hours a day?

Hi Nana4Twins,

1) You do not need to setup/teardown every time the sun goes down. It is only necessary if the weather gets too bad (rain/heavy wind) then you should take it down.
2) Those two new 6v batteries will definitely have much more storage electricity you can have. Do you know what loads you will be running and what their draw is? The panel is sufficient by itself as a charging unit/trickle charging. But, If you are in a high demand of power it may not be suitable.


All the best,
The Renogy Team

 

[ttpadilla]

Hi Nana4Twins,

1) You do not need to setup/teardown every time the sun goes down. It is only necessary if the weather gets too bad (rain/heavy wind) then you should take it down.
2) Those two new 6v batteries will definitely have much more storage electricity you can have. Do you know what loads you will be running and what their draw is? The panel is sufficient by itself as a charging unit/trickle charging. But, If you are in a high demand of power it may not be suitable.


All the best,
The Renogy Team

I'm only running the water pump as needed, propane refrigerator (the igniter uses 12v power), and one light at a time in the evening, plus the CO and Propane Sensors are tied into 12v. If I ever figure out how to tie in a real inverter to power the receptacles in this RV, my load would undoubtedly increase, but for now, I think I'm only using 25-35 amp hours a day? This is a pure guess, as I mentioned I'm pretty ignorant still.

 

[mariasman]

I'm only running the water pump as needed, propane refrigerator (the igniter uses 12v power), and one light at a time in the evening, plus the CO and Propane Sensors are tied into 12v.  If I ever figure out how to tie in a real inverter to power the receptacles in this RV, my load would undoubtedly increase, but for now, I think I'm only using 25-35 amp hours a day?  This is a pure guess, as I mentioned I'm pretty ignorant still.

If you are using 35 amp hours each day, then that equates to (35)(12) = 420 watt hours each day. This is more than you can expect a single 100 watt panel to provide reliably each day. You can't have too many panels (assuming it's not to the point of absurdity). Unfortunately, having too few panels can present real problems. If you're in doubt, then get another panel.

 

[MikeRuth]

I seriously doubt your even pulling that much. The water pump dosen't run enough to really make any difference. I mean even if you shower the total time in a day I'd bet is less than 30 minutes and the next item in line would be the light, and then again for how long. I don't even wanna know what its rated at, it's a light and I'm guessing no more than 12 solid hours?

The igniter isn't even really measurable. Co propo sensors again very negligible.

I'd say that if you can ascertain that those batteries get fully charged and checked with a hydrometer, and there good, then from that point forward your 100 watts could keep up with what you have going on. Now if you don't get the sunshine on those panels every day you may start getting into a deficit.

MY conclusion, batteries charged and rest at 12.7 volts. Go about your daily usage for a week and charging, then check the resting voltage again. still at 12.7, your golden. Dropping off, might need to do an occasional shore charge to get them back topped off.

Take care.

 

[Renogy]

I'm only running the water pump as needed, propane refrigerator (the igniter uses 12v power), and one light at a time in the evening, plus the CO and Propane Sensors are tied into 12v.  If I ever figure out how to tie in a real inverter to power the receptacles in this RV, my load would undoubtedly increase, but for now, I think I'm only using 25-35 amp hours a day?  This is a pure guess, as I mentioned I'm pretty ignorant still.

Hi Nana4Twins,

If your “amp-hour” guess is based off of appliances that state they use 12v, then that panel that you are using is accurate for what you are going for.

Following up with what mariasman had replied, a single 100 watt panel is correctly sized for a system of this draw. However, let's say, for instance, that a few days are more cloudy and overcast than usual. That will be detrimental to the system and so, getting another panel wouldn't hurt to help through those “less than average” days of sun.

All the best,
The Renogy Team

 

[ttpadilla]

I seriously doubt your even pulling that much. The water pump dosen't run enough to really make any difference. I mean even if you shower the total time in a day I'd bet is less than 30 minutes and the next item in line would be the light, and then again for how long. I don't even wanna know what its rated at, it's a light and I'm guessing no more than 12 solid hours?

The igniter isn't even really measurable. Co propo sensors again very negligible.

I'd say that if you can ascertain that those batteries get fully charged and checked with a hydrometer, and there good, then from that point forward your 100 watts could keep up with what you have going on. Now if you don't get the sunshine on those panels every day you may start getting into a deficit.

MY conclusion, batteries charged and rest at 12.7 volts. Go about your daily usage for a week and charging, then check the resting voltage again. still at 12.7, your golden. Dropping off, might need to do an occasional shore charge to get them back topped off.

Take care.

Thanks, Mike! The light is only on for about 3-4 hours at night, shower water usage is more like 5-7 minutes as I turn it off while soaping up.

 

[ttpadilla]

Hi Nana4Twins,

If your “amp-hour” guess is based off of appliances that state they use 12v, then that panel that you are using is accurate for what you are going for.

Following up with what mariasman had replied, a single 100 watt panel is correctly sized for a system of this draw. However, let's say, for instance, that a few days are more cloudy and overcast than usual. That will be detrimental to the system and so, getting another panel wouldn't hurt to help through those “less than average” days of sun.

All the best,
The Renogy Team

I'm for sure saving up for more panels, anyway, just wanted to make sure the 6v batts were a good choice for what I currently have. Thank you!

 

[ccbreder]

Thumbs up to Renogy. Thanks for starting this thread.

 

[FortWorthVanNoob]

Renogy, I'm about to pull the trigger on getting 3 of your flexible 100 watt panels. My idea is to use adhesive to fasten them to the roof. Unfortunately the garage I park at is barely tall enough for my van otherwise I would just buy your regular panels with the Z bracket attachment.

My question is since there won't be any air space underneath the panel, will the health of the panel be effected?

 

[Seraphim]

Nana4twins: our phantom draw - including all sensors and powering the ready light on a CD player - is .2 amps an hour. Running our larger sized propane fridge kicks that up to .8 amps an hour. That's about 20 Amps a day. With lighting (several hours) and vent fan usage (all night) we pull about 25 amps a day. Round it up to 30, if you like. In the morning, our 210ah battery is own to 92%, in general. The 400 watt panel setup brings us up to 100% in less than 2 hours on an average day.

Hope this info helps.

 

[Seraphim]

Ps - that 25 amps also includes running the water heater for 15 minutes a night and taking our showers.

 

[IGBT]

Seraphim, curious what did you get as far as solar watts per day when you went to Alaska?

 

[Renogy]

Renogy, I'm about to pull the trigger on getting 3 of your flexible 100 watt panels. My idea is to use adhesive to fasten them to the roof. Unfortunately the garage I park at is barely tall enough for my van otherwise I would just buy your regular panels with the Z bracket attachment.

My question is since there won't be any air space underneath the panel, will the health of the panel be effected?

Hey FortWorthVanNoob,

Adhesives are definitely okay for this. The panel will be able to support itself fine even with no airflow underneath the panel.
What type of adhesive are you going for?

All the best,
The Renogy Team

 

[FortWorthVanNoob]

Hey FortWorthVanNoob,

Adhesives are definitely okay for this. The panel will be able to support itself fine even with no airflow underneath the panel.
What type of adhesive are you going for?

All the best,
The Renogy Team

Haven't decided yet. Has anyone here done this before?

 

[Renogy]

Haven't decided yet.

While we don't have a specific recommendation for you, please make sure that it is an industrial strength adhesive.

All the best,
The Renogy Team

 

[oldogre]

What is the point of a positive ground charge controller, and why did my renogy 200 watt system come with one? and not a regular negative ground controller - Dan

 

[Renogy]

What is the point of a positive ground charge controller, and why did my renogy 200 watt system come with one? and not a regular negative ground controller - Dan

Hi Dan,

The charge controllers are positive ground due to the country of origin, but we are currently in the process of getting negative ground charge controllers instead. Positive ground charge controllers tend to be slightly cheaper and CAN still work on a negative ground system.

The solar panels and battery plug-ins on the controller are perfectly fine to use.

In order for it to work correctly, you must not use the DC Load Terminals on the charge controller.

All the best,
The Renogy Team

 

[akrvbob]

The problem with gluing the panels down directly is you can never remove them. I'd only do that if the problem was a curved fiberglass roof and nothing else would work. I'd consider hanging them off the side of the van by the grommet holes and use bungees to hold them at an angle to stakes in the ground. That way you'd get shade on the van, great air flow under them and easily adjustable angles.

Are they strong enough to hang by the grommets?
Bob