My Radio Brian's solar installation has begun.
12 x 460W panels in place and wired up.
Each weighs 25 kg and is 2.11m x 1.05m x 35mm deep.
Each pair are wired in series providing +/- 90V @ 10A.
The six pairs are then fed individually into the TX room.

Cable runs just need tidying up now.

I said that to you ages ago, Canary islands + solar panels = (dats the guy that sells you electricity there). It's a brilliant resource, I know this being too red headed to survive in it! Good luck and treat yourself to a night out when your next bill comes in, I predict you will be in a very good mood...

How are you going to use the power? The batteries you'll need will be incredibly expensive.....

We used to run our Californian station using a mixture of solar panels and a couple of little wind turbines. These charged "Leisure" batteries, which were used to power the rig and the link receiver. The most difficult part of the whole design was the charging controller!

Albert H wrote: ↑Sun Jun 18, 2023 9:52 pm How are you going to use the power? The batteries you'll need will be incredibly expensive.....

Albert.......... don't be impatient....

All will be revealed in good time

yellowbeard wrote: ↑Sun Jun 18, 2023 8:35 pm I said that to you ages ago, Canary islands + solar panels =

I have been planning a solar system for over a year now

I have eventually taken the plunge

Just over a year ago I made a little program to automatically copy W/m2 solar data
(called website data scraping) from the local weather station 14 hours a day...
http://www.meteomaspalomas.com/ The page updates every 5 min however I decided data from every 15min would be fine
I now have real (not estimated) data every day for a year June > June

This is the average MAX W/m2 in June
And the average MIN W/m2 in December
Both plots in one graph so I know what I need to plan for.

See me being jealous? I would get 10% of your bad day and 30% of your good days Wattage. You can keep the 116.8 Fahrenheit though...

Don’t forget the air con bill to keep the tx cool.

I have often wondered if this was possible, I’ve fone it with 4w, but I’d cry if I saw the bill for purchasing all those solar panels (that said, it’s certainly an investment, and should help you reduce cost over the next 10yrs).

We certainly don’t have the sun here in the UK out of summer , not without the wind back up Albert mentions.

Now, if anyone ever comes up with a station powered by running water, then the UK will surely be the place to do it

I know people in Indonesia who used a little Pelton Water Wheel to drive a small Medium Wave rig! They also had Solar Panels (just a few because they were so expensive) and a Wind Turbine built from an old washing machine motor! I helped them out with the charge controller for their batteries. They used huge lead-acid batteries they'd got secondhand from a company that installed burglar and fire alarms. They replaced the (perfectly good) batteries every couple of years, so they had loads of otherwise useless spares that they were glad to sell off for next to nothing, just to get them out of their warehouse!

yellowbeard wrote: ↑Tue Jun 20, 2023 9:58 pm See me being jealous? I would get 10% of your bad day and 30% of your good days Wattage. You can keep the 116.8 Fahrenheit though...

OK

LeeCavanagh wrote: ↑Tue Jun 20, 2023 10:08 pm Don’t forget the air con bill to keep the tx cool.

Well up now, 4.5yrs of being ''ON AIR'' I've managed to cope without it

LeeCavanagh wrote: ↑Tue Jun 20, 2023 10:08 pm Now, if anyone ever comes up with a station powered by running water, then the UK will surely be the place to do it

If you were next to a river that would be a great Idea in the UK

OK I picked up the Inverter yesterday

This is what I have gone for

Of Course I had to have a look inside

BriansBrain wrote: ↑Thu Jun 22, 2023 12:37 pm

LeeCavanagh wrote: ↑Tue Jun 20, 2023 10:08 pm Don’t forget the air con bill to keep the tx cool.

Well up now, 4.5yrs of being ''ON AIR'' I've managed to cope without it

Please tell me you at least have a windows open (or extractor’s, I know from running only 500w that heat soon builds up in the tx room, ok with extractor and/or air con. I’m gushing you must be getting rid of it rather than it just building up. 500w alone can turn a room into 30c in only 3hrs, and that’s with a heat sink that feels pretty much cool to to touch

tvtv wrote: ↑Thu Jun 22, 2023 10:44 pm Please tell me you at least have a windows open (or extractor’s, I know from running only 500w that heat soon builds up in the tx room, ok with extractor and/or air con. I’m gushing you must be getting rid of it rather than it just building up. 500w alone can turn a room into 30c in only 3hrs, and that’s with a heat sink that feels pretty much cool to to touch

Please don't worry Brian's TX room is well ventilated

nice

Very good. Sorry to be a stick in the mud, but we were talking about solar at work and someone was claiming that at 25C plus the solar panels loose a lot of their output. In the canaries that's a normal day plus more. Were they talking rubbish or can you get heatproof panels

The solar panels I've used were specified to 39°C, but showed a marked reduction in output when we got to over 30°C. In fact they were so damned useless most of the time (in California!), that I had to supplement them with a couple of small wind turbines!

house-every-weekend wrote: ↑Sun Jun 25, 2023 6:41 pm Very good. Sorry to be a stick in the mud, but we were talking about solar at work and someone was claiming that at 25C plus the solar panels loose a lot of their output. In the canaries that's a normal day plus more. Were they talking rubbish...

Yes in the high heat of the Canary Islands where I am they loose voltage and so power
This is why I have 12 when I really only need 8 > 10

house-every-weekend wrote: ↑Sun Jun 25, 2023 6:41 pm can you get heatproof panels

I don't think so no

Albert H wrote: ↑Mon Jun 26, 2023 12:55 am The solar panels I've used were specified to 39°C, but showed a marked reduction in output when we got to over 30°C. In fact they were so damned useless most of the time (in California!), that I had to supplement them with a couple of small wind turbines!

This is from the pdf of the panels I am using
PANEL SOLAR 460W JA SOLAR MONO PERC HC