Hi All,

In an earlier post I said that I intended to instal a solar charging system in our Puck L. Well, finally finished it today. And it works.

It's based upon a removable 80w solar panel, charging my 100Ah leisure battery. The charge is managed by a Victron Mppt solar controller. Mppt, Maximum Power Point Transfer solar controllers are much more efficient than the older PWM, Pulse Width Modulation controllers and are 90% plus efficient.

The battery voltage, panel wattage etc is monitored on my iPhone or iPad via a Bluetooth dongle connected to the controller, this was actually cheaper than a dedicated battery/panel monitor (I did already have the iPhone and iPad).

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Here is view of the Solar Controller and Bluetooth dongle, the supply from the panel comes in through the plastic fitting through the floor, you can just see the edge of the battery at the bottom of the photo ( see my other post : Getting cables in

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The solar panel is a semi flexible unit in which the substrate is an aluminium sheet, in order to prevent scratching of the roof I stuck a piece of closed cell foam, from a Tesco camping sleep mat, on the base of the panel. This also has the benefit of stopping it sliding around to much on the roof. I attached it to the roof by using 4 of the bungee loops with a ball on the end as used in awnings, to these i fitted four large plastic hooks, fortunately its all the right size for them to hook under the erected roof with just the right amount of tension. It takes about 3 minutes to put it on the roof hook under and connect up. On the floor you can see the cardboard box I will store the panel in in transit, it only weighs a couple of kilos so won't affect my payload too much.

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Side views showing cable coming down of the 'van and the Anderson connector used to connect to the Victron Controller.

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In addition to the Solar panel, I have replaced all the internal lighting with LEDs and added 2 more reading spots at the front of the van and a led strip round, and behind, the pelmets so I expect our power consumption to be a lot less.

Hopefully this should make us independent of hook ups, we are travelling to Spain next weekend so hopefully we can save the EHU costs which are probably about 10% of the site costs so equal to drop in the value of the Pound against the Euro since Brexit!

Good looking project, very neat on the roof.
Does the underside of the panel get hot? Earlier rigid panels had to be spaced off the roof to allow the heat to dissipate.

I currently have a folding 60W panel that I have chained up to the A frame. Works OK as one can move it around to maximise the light falling on it. Looks pretty rubbish though and is vulnerable to damage and theft. That's why I like your installation :)

Hi Ray,

Thanks for your kind words. I'm really pleased with it, just fortuitous that the bungee thingys and the hooks were the perfect size, when I planned it I thought I may have to use string and bungee cord to get the fit which would have looked a bit messy and taken longer to rig/derig.

No idea whether it gets hot but the foam should act as an insulator as one side of the mat, the side I glued to the panel, has a foil covering. Also, the installation instructions suggest sticking it direct to the roof with Sikaflex so no gap is envisioned by the supplier. Maybe with rigid panels, which tend to be glass with a space beneath, the depth of the frame, you get more of a greenhouse effect?

I know that a horizontal panel is not the most efficient but, like you, with my last van I used a rigid panel but I I seemed to be continually chasing the sun to get the best incidence, often not catching it and going into shade so I reasoned that if it always has a clear view of the sky on top of the van then it would be just as efficient, time will tell!

Thanks for the reply Chris, that's very helpful :)