When I first started messing with solar, my uncle gave me two of the Harbor freight 45 watts kits, which had three 15 watts amorphous solar panels in each kit. I hooked them up and I never could get enough out of them to charge two marine batteries that I had bought for the purpose. Also, their connections corroded and pretty soon I was getting nothing almost. So I cut the connectors off, and wired the two kits in series. I would get 3.2 amps, on the best day. Here it is five years later. I changed everything. I have 1600 watts of solar panels and a 600 watts wind generator now. I charge twenty deep cycle batteries with them, and I have a 24 volts, 100 amps lithium iron phosphate battery 🔋 coming Wednesday. I'm getting another one in December. I used a 40 amps Epever charge controller and a 24 volts Aims Power inverter charger, 2000 watts. I had 1200 watts of panels facing the morning Sun and four facing West, today the highest reading I saw was 717 watts from the solar panels, and at the same time, around 200 from the wind generator. I saw 500 watts at one point from a wind gust for a few seconds... I'll give you some advice. Solder everything you can, eliminate every connecter/adapter that you can too. Keep the cables as short as possible to the panels. I have each pair of 100 watts panels in a frame. I made them out of square tubing and welded them in a rectangle. They're pretty easy to move around except for the first one, which I used 1 1/4 inch tubing, it's a little heavy. The later ones are 3/4 inch. Each frame has two 100 watts panels, two frames per cable coming in, so I have four cables for 1600 watts. My stuff works great now. I did my panels that way so I could bring them into the barn when there's hail or tornado warnings out. They're easier to handle and I can leave each pair wired for 24 volts. After I get the lithium batteries hooked up, Im going to split part of the lead acid batteries off and create a twelve volts system with another 2000 watts inverter. It's a modified sine wave inverter. The 24 volts one is pure sine wave. I live in my uncle's barn, I was homeless in 2016, so he lets me stay here, I built a room inside the barn. There's grid power, but it's so far away from the power pole that it will only run a light bulb 💡. So I got the idea to build my own power system. I have plenty usually except during long cold cloudy spells. I think the lithium batteries will help some. I just thought I would comment. My next power project is a DC wind generator. Ill have to get another charge controller probably for it. I already have five blades and a hub for it. It might be a home made one this time. Two things I have that have helped a lot. A Fluke 21 multimeter, and a cordless Milwaukee soldering iron. It's 5: 30 a.m., the voltage ⚡ is 25.1. In about two hours, charging will begin again. So, in practice, my twenty batteries are cycling between 25.6 and 25.0 volts, or 12.8 to 12.5 each, on a normal day. I just finished a six day period of rainy weather and no sunshine. The batteries were down to 24.1 volts. That's very rare. I almost had to use my ⛽ generator. Two hundred amp hours of lithium batteries should help. I can't wait to hook the first one up. Boy, those things are pricey. But I can't help but want to try one or two. I figured I had better get them before the price goes up or something. I wouldn't be able to afford them if they went up much more.
Thank you for showing your trial and error and how everything has worked out for you. Great information for stubborn newbies who are impatient like myself! So happy to have discovered your channel today.
Greg, thank you for the information. I have 500ws of HF panels and really don't wat to spend a ton of $ on new panels. I started out with Jackery generators and I've been ok using HF solar panel hub. But, I'm looking at generators that use MC4s. Now I know what to do. This was very informative. Rev Guy
Thanks for this video! Portable solar panels are something I’m interested in! I’ll look up the equivalent of those panels for the European market. This video made me think about an old National Geographic magazine that I have, dated 1956, if I’m not mistaken. It had an advertisement by Bell Industries on the back cover. My memory could be playing a trick on me, but I think the ad showed a family having a picnic on a lawn, and carrying with them a solar panel and some converter of some kind to transform the light of the Sun into energy. I’ll look for that old magazine and see if I got the details correct. Anyway, thanks for this video and I’m looking forward to buying a portable solar panel for myself. Always good inspiration from Greg Anderson!
Thanks for showing your thought process. A lot of knowledge conveyed. I’m on the same journey. I’d imagine that knowing what you do now, you could get the correct cables and adapters for less on on Amazon or wherever.
Thanks for your video. I was thinking about getting two of the Harbor Freight 100 W panels to run in parallel into my Goal Zero Yeti 1500X. I have the Goal Zero 30 foot HPP (Anderson) extension cable, which uses 12 gauge wire. I'd have to get an adapter to convert the two SAE connectors to one Anderson connector, also with 12 gauge wire. Harbor Freight has the 100 W panels on sale for $90 ($40 off) this weekend, at least in my area. BTW, gauge is misspelled "gague" in your video title.
How would I connect those HF panels to a small charge controller where you insert the wire and tighten it with a screw? I'd hat to cut the connector off the wire.
MC4 connector were the standard connector for most 50watt systems on up. I'm thinging of using 10awg wire, and either an Anderson connector or a MC4 connector. Both connector are more durable and can handle more amps. Another idea that I have is replacing the 12awg wire on my Harbor Freight panels with a heavier 10awg wire.
Yes. I figured 10 awg would be more than I absolutely needed but, since that’s the only wire I am going to buy for a while, why not step up my budget for 10 awg.
Thank you for the infornational video, sir. One thing I noticed is: Your solar panels are pretty damaged. Theres a lot of nicks in the protective foil on the back of your panels, in some spots I can even see through the panels. This means that most likely the entire string is now useless and wont generate any energy. This means: With every nick on the back of the panel, it loses a lot of peak generating power and therefore efficency. So you might want to take better care of your panels or protect the back somehow. No offense.
Great video as I'm new to solar. I have those exact panels and still have a question. I have an SAE splitter to connect both panels with the third line going to the battery. Do I need to reverse polarity between the panels and then again on the output line to the battery? Sorry if it's dumb but this is very new to me and have zero experience in wiring.
Myself I would have put the MC4 connector on the panel wires. Running 2 panels in parallel 200wat in ideal conditions. I have 3 different batteries that I solar charge and 10 gauge panel wires. Plus you can hook up a positive fuse between panel and plug to your generator. I buy solar panels they come with MC4 connectors, that’s pretty much the standard.
Hi Greg, love the channel. Sorry to ask this in an unrelated video but I didn't know how else to contact you. Do you know the smallest/neatest casio that has a countdown timer where you can move the numbers up AND down using the buttons on the right of the watch? I have a 5610 that can do that but sometimes a G shock square is bigger than I want to wear. I love my B640W but that can only move the numbers up and you have to go up through the entire 60 minutes or 24 hours to zero the timer. I hope that question is clear, I'm not sure how to describe it concisely.
You are patient instructor... can your machines handle double the voltage and then pair them in series and keep the amps constant...@ 5.56 Amps, the connector should be able to handle the lower amps, and higher voltage with the same connectors, while maintaining the same power (Watts)
If the input can handle higher voltage then, yes, you can make series connections with lower amps AND use wiring that isn't as thick (lower gauge). But that's the real trick. You CANNOT input higher voltage than the device can handle. You can provide higher amps and the device will just ignore that, only accepting the amps it's capable of accepting. But too-high voltage will damage a device.
@@GoodTimekeeper very insightful, you've helped my understandIng of a solar controller, would putting a cheap solar controller in line be of any help, or does the unit have that built in already?
Hi, thank you for the update and potential risk of fire. I have the set up you HAD with the Anker 535 and I do not plan to get a new bigger Anker model anytime soon. I should be fine using my two Harbor Freight panels with the SAE connections in parallel giving me up to 200 watts, but Anker 535 only taking a max of 100 watts. Right?
I was fine until I started using the larger Anker device which pulled in 200 watts. I actually used it for several weeks before I realized that the connectors were starting to melt. So I don’t think it would have started a fire but it certainly was too hot for the wire and connectors I was using. But, again, there wasn’t a problem when the equipment was only drawing 100 watts.
I'm sure Harbor Freight is using SAE plugs to coincide with the SAE input plugs on an RVs. If you buy an RV equipped with a solar plug, the solar input plug receptacle is an SAE type.
Do you mean the four prong flat trailer connector? My RV came prewired with MC4s on the roof (what a perk, they make you buy the charge regulator and panels yourself) but I was wondering if the trailer connection feeds the 12v system too.
Having the 2 x 100W panels is just contingency - you don't "getaway" with Watts. Power. If one is producing 50W and the other the same 50W then it's the equivalent of you having just 1 panel producing 100W.
![ละลาย (LALALYE) - DAOU PITTAYA ต้าห์อู๋ พิทยา [OFFICIAL MV]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/wo6r9TgausI/mqdefault.jpg)
first relatable explanation of "in series" and "in parallel" that I've come across-thank you!
When I first started messing with solar, my uncle gave me two of the Harbor freight 45 watts kits, which had three 15 watts amorphous solar panels in each kit. I hooked them up and I never could get enough out of them to charge two marine batteries that I had bought for the purpose. Also, their connections corroded and pretty soon I was getting nothing almost. So I cut the connectors off, and wired the two kits in series. I would get 3.2 amps, on the best day. Here it is five years later. I changed everything. I have 1600 watts of solar panels and a 600 watts wind generator now. I charge twenty deep cycle batteries with them, and I have a 24 volts, 100 amps lithium iron phosphate battery 🔋 coming Wednesday. I'm getting another one in December. I used a 40 amps Epever charge controller and a 24 volts Aims Power inverter charger, 2000 watts. I had 1200 watts of panels facing the morning Sun and four facing West, today the highest reading I saw was 717 watts from the solar panels, and at the same time, around 200 from the wind generator. I saw 500 watts at one point from a wind gust for a few seconds... I'll give you some advice. Solder everything you can, eliminate every connecter/adapter that you can too. Keep the cables as short as possible to the panels. I have each pair of 100 watts panels in a frame. I made them out of square tubing and welded them in a rectangle. They're pretty easy to move around except for the first one, which I used 1 1/4 inch tubing, it's a little heavy. The later ones are 3/4 inch. Each frame has two 100 watts panels, two frames per cable coming in, so I have four cables for 1600 watts. My stuff works great now. I did my panels that way so I could bring them into the barn when there's hail or tornado warnings out. They're easier to handle and I can leave each pair wired for 24 volts. After I get the lithium batteries hooked up, Im going to split part of the lead acid batteries off and create a twelve volts system with another 2000 watts inverter. It's a modified sine wave inverter. The 24 volts one is pure sine wave. I live in my uncle's barn, I was homeless in 2016, so he lets me stay here, I built a room inside the barn. There's grid power, but it's so far away from the power pole that it will only run a light bulb 💡. So I got the idea to build my own power system. I have plenty usually except during long cold cloudy spells. I think the lithium batteries will help some. I just thought I would comment. My next power project is a DC wind generator. Ill have to get another charge controller probably for it. I already have five blades and a hub for it. It might be a home made one this time. Two things I have that have helped a lot. A Fluke 21 multimeter, and a cordless Milwaukee soldering iron. It's 5: 30 a.m., the voltage ⚡ is 25.1. In about two hours, charging will begin again. So, in practice, my twenty batteries are cycling between 25.6 and 25.0 volts, or 12.8 to 12.5 each, on a normal day. I just finished a six day period of rainy weather and no sunshine. The batteries were down to 24.1 volts. That's very rare. I almost had to use my ⛽ generator. Two hundred amp hours of lithium batteries should help. I can't wait to hook the first one up. Boy, those things are pricey. But I can't help but want to try one or two. I figured I had better get them before the price goes up or something. I wouldn't be able to afford them if they went up much more.
Thank you for showing your trial and error and how everything has worked out for you. Great information for stubborn newbies who are impatient like myself! So happy to have discovered your channel today.
Greg, thank you for the information. I have 500ws of HF panels and really don't wat to spend a ton of $ on new panels. I started out with Jackery generators and I've been ok using HF solar panel hub. But, I'm looking at generators that use MC4s. Now I know what to do. This was very informative. Rev Guy
Hi Greg. It's nice to see you again.
Thank you.
That was a good plain, down to earth video.
Taking nothing away from Greg - his channel is terrific, Will Prowse has tons of solar info if you want to go deeper. He's an expert's expert.
Thanks for this video!
Portable solar panels are something I’m interested in!
I’ll look up the equivalent of those panels for the European market.
This video made me think about an old National Geographic magazine that I have, dated 1956, if I’m not mistaken.
It had an advertisement by Bell Industries on the back cover.
My memory could be playing a trick on me, but I think the ad showed a family having a picnic on a lawn, and carrying with them a solar panel and some converter of some kind to transform the light of the Sun into energy.
I’ll look for that old magazine and see if I got the details correct.
Anyway, thanks for this video and I’m looking forward to buying a portable solar panel for myself.
Always good inspiration from Greg Anderson!
All Power makes nice portable panel at nice price i use them in Philippines for my wife's systerm
Yes the SAE connectors do overheat a lot. I had to convert mine to MC-4.
Thanks for showing your thought process. A lot of knowledge conveyed. I’m on the same journey. I’d imagine that knowing what you do now, you could get the correct cables and adapters for less on on Amazon or wherever.
Very informative, thank you. May I suggest that the more connectors you introduce in line the more possible points of failure you introduce in line.
Thanks for your video. I was thinking about getting two of the Harbor Freight 100 W panels to run in parallel into my Goal Zero Yeti 1500X. I have the Goal Zero 30 foot HPP (Anderson) extension cable, which uses 12 gauge wire. I'd have to get an adapter to convert the two SAE connectors to one Anderson connector, also with 12 gauge wire.
Harbor Freight has the 100 W panels on sale for $90 ($40 off) this weekend, at least in my area.
BTW, gauge is misspelled "gague" in your video title.
Thanks Greg very interesting video 👍
How would I connect those HF panels to a small charge controller where you insert the wire and tighten it with a screw? I'd hat to cut the connector off the wire.
MC4 connector were the standard connector for most 50watt systems on up. I'm thinging of using 10awg wire, and either an Anderson connector or a MC4 connector. Both connector are more durable and can handle more amps. Another idea that I have is replacing the 12awg wire on my Harbor Freight panels with a heavier 10awg wire.
I am at that juncture. What gauge wire did you finally used, looks like a 10 awg, yes?
Yes. I figured 10 awg would be more than I absolutely needed but, since that’s the only wire I am going to buy for a while, why not step up my budget for 10 awg.
Thank you for the infornational video, sir.
One thing I noticed is: Your solar panels are pretty damaged. Theres a lot of nicks in the protective foil on the back of your panels, in some spots I can even see through the panels. This means that most likely the entire string is now useless and wont generate any energy. This means: With every nick on the back of the panel, it loses a lot of peak generating power and therefore efficency. So you might want to take better care of your panels or protect the back somehow. No offense.
Those are some big tough solar panels.
I like Anderson connectors myself but those look pretty good
Great video as I'm new to solar. I have those exact panels and still have a question. I have an SAE splitter to connect both panels with the third line going to the battery. Do I need to reverse polarity between the panels and then again on the output line to the battery? Sorry if it's dumb but this is very new to me and have zero experience in wiring.
maybe I missed it - what wire size did you use for the combined run?
voltage drop is another consideration.
Hi, which outfit do I need need to run my music player and my fan and my computer
Good video. Please invest in an auto-ranging multimeter. It's so convenient and not much more expensive than manual range DMMs.
Well thank you for failing for us to understand your journey, much appreciated! :)
Yeah he jumped around so much he made it more confusing I think but there are more videos from others that are explained better
Myself I would have put the MC4 connector on the panel wires. Running 2 panels in parallel 200wat in ideal conditions. I have 3 different batteries that I solar charge and 10 gauge panel wires. Plus you can hook up a positive fuse between panel and plug to your generator. I buy solar panels they come with MC4 connectors, that’s pretty much the standard.
Great explanation! What gage wire did you use?
Hi Greg, love the channel. Sorry to ask this in an unrelated video but I didn't know how else to contact you.
Do you know the smallest/neatest casio that has a countdown timer where you can move the numbers up AND down using the buttons on the right of the watch?
I have a 5610 that can do that but sometimes a G shock square is bigger than I want to wear. I love my B640W but that can only move the numbers up and you have to go up through the entire 60 minutes or 24 hours to zero the timer.
I hope that question is clear, I'm not sure how to describe it concisely.
You are patient instructor... can your machines handle double the voltage and then pair them in series and keep the amps constant...@ 5.56 Amps, the connector should be able to handle the lower amps, and higher voltage with the same connectors, while maintaining the same power (Watts)
If the input can handle higher voltage then, yes, you can make series connections with lower amps AND use wiring that isn't as thick (lower gauge). But that's the real trick. You CANNOT input higher voltage than the device can handle. You can provide higher amps and the device will just ignore that, only accepting the amps it's capable of accepting. But too-high voltage will damage a device.
@@GoodTimekeeper very insightful, you've helped my understandIng of a solar controller, would putting a cheap solar controller in line be of any help, or does the unit have that built in already?
Also, low amp load lIghts would let you know when it is charged..
Hi, thank you for the update and potential risk of fire. I have the set up you HAD with the Anker 535 and I do not plan to get a new bigger Anker model anytime soon. I should be fine using my two Harbor Freight panels with the SAE connections in parallel giving me up to 200 watts, but Anker 535 only taking a max of 100 watts. Right?
I was fine until I started using the larger Anker device which pulled in 200 watts. I actually used it for several weeks before I realized that the connectors were starting to melt. So I don’t think it would have started a fire but it certainly was too hot for the wire and connectors I was using. But, again, there wasn’t a problem when the equipment was only drawing 100 watts.
Hi, Greg. Would you buy a Casio Protrek watch like the one Denzel Washington wears on Man on Fire?
Is it that model still available?
I have a dozen of these that I've swapped in mc4 connectors and 4s 3p
I'm sure Harbor Freight is using SAE plugs to coincide with the SAE input plugs on an RVs. If you buy an RV equipped with a solar plug, the solar input plug receptacle is an SAE type.
Do you mean the four prong flat trailer connector? My RV came prewired with MC4s on the roof (what a perk, they make you buy the charge regulator and panels yourself) but I was wondering if the trailer connection feeds the 12v system too.
Those power stations protect themselves from reverse polarity.
Inbuilt.
So not cheaper than using theirs?
Having the 2 x 100W panels is just contingency - you don't "getaway" with Watts. Power. If one is producing 50W and the other the same 50W then it's the equivalent of you having just 1 panel producing 100W.
you hurt my brain
why not simply have gotten a renogy panel with mc4 connectors and have just made a simple set of leg stands