I just bought two 1.8W solar panels from CTC...

[fisher]

They were on sale for $9.99, so I picked up 2 of them figuring they may come in handy for my boat...but the box says it will maintain a battery. Does that mean they will not charge up a battery?

 

Would it be better if I hooked them up in parallel or series if I wanted to charge up my batteries - or would doing one or the other cause damage?

 

Anyone have experience with one of these?

Thanks!

Edited May 26, 2011 by fisher

[Fish4Eyes]

It will charge it up, but it will take forever. See if it has an amps rating. That will give you an idea of how effective it is.

[skidoosafari]

They were on sale for $9.99, so I picked up 2 of them figuring they may come in handy for my boat...but the box says it will maintain a battery. Does that mean they will not charge up a battery?

 

Would it be better if I hooked them up in parallel or series if I wanted to charge up my batteries - or would doing one or the other cause damage?

 

Anyone have experience with one of these?

Thanks!

 

Hey fisher i bought two of them on the weekend as well. Was going to post the exact same question just haven't got round to it yet. I did use one of them on the trolling battery this passed weekend and seem to do the job. That being said i did put the battery on the charger( electric) at night .

[danbouck]

They will keep it topped up but are useless for charging from dead unless you can wait a few weeks

[fisher]

They will keep it topped up but are useless for charging from dead unless you can wait a few weeks

 

Fair enough..I just wanted to see if they would "top" them up after a day using the battery for trolling, radio, etc....

 

Would connecting two of them to the one battery help any - and if so, do I connect them directly or in series?

 

Someone asked about the amperage - It says 125 mAh on them.

[Bigfisherman]

Your looking at 100ma in the best conditions. So for example a 50amp battery will take 5 days @ 10hrs/day of sunshine.......

[Terry]

seems to me you will get .15 that's point one five amps

2 of them .3 amps

not very close to maintaining a battery....

 

6 more of them and you will have about 1 amp and you will be talking business

that's

if I remember my electronic from when I got my amateur radio license