Would someone please help me on a installation question ?

System

I would like to install an outdoor security camera where I keep my horses. My problem is there is no electricity available there. I currently run some lighting off of deep cycle batteries and they get used very little. I have 4 six volt deep cycle batteries and I believe the amperage for each battery was approximately 350. I run 2 of the batteries in series to give me 12 volts and then I run the 2 sets in parrallel to give me 12 volts and alot of amps and I run my lights off them. I want to run a 12 volt security camera for 4 hours each night and then have a solar panel for charging. could someone please tell me everything I will need to do this properly and how I would connect everything. I would even need to know proper wire size. The camera would be approximately 20 feet away from my batteries and the solar panel could be within 10 feet of the batteries. I know there probably more information you will need to give me an answer. Just let me know what it is you need to know. I'm a real beginner when it comes to this stuff. Please help.

niel

Re: Would someone please help me on a installation question ?

a bigger problem might be keeping 700ah of batteries charged than the problems in powering cameras. generally we recommend between 5 and 13% of capacity and a charge controller with fusing for all battery connections, but if no other loads are on it you could go with a smaller % down to no farther than 3%. i would, however, try to avoid going that low. 5% of 700ah is 35 amps!!!!!!!!!!! that's quite a bit of capacity for a camera that may be about 2 to 7w or so depending on the camera and a few lights (hopefully cfls or larger leds).
another possible problem could be the high charge voltages that batteries go through as cameras want and require more regulation than the batteries do. they don't require a lot of power so a small inverter to a highly regulated walwort may make it easier to achieve the required regulation. i have not tried my cameras directly to the batteries, but i have everything on ac through a backups and then to the little wall supplies. it does suffer somewhat for efficiency doing it this way, but cameras are finicky and may not be cheap to risk damaging.

RandomJoe

Re: Would someone please help me on a installation question ?

You'll need to know how much power the camera draws. Most cameras I've seen and used (network or IP cameras) use very little power themselves, however for outdoor use there are often some extra accessories that can push up the requirements - IR LEDs for nighttime vision, maybe a heater element to keep the lens or (if used) covering dome from fogging up.

Do you have a particular camera in mind, that you can get specs for?

What is charging your battery bank right now, for the lights? If you already have something in place for that I doubt the system would notice the addition of the camera. If you just manually charge the batteries now, then if you want the solar system to be able to cover the occasional lighting use you'll have to add in the power requirements of the lamps too (how many watts, for how long). As niel mentioned, the requirements to keep that size battery array charged solely with solar are going to significantly swamp the power requirements of the camera.

Hm, one other question - how do you intend to only run the cameras for 4 hours per day? (What will switch it on/off?)

System2

Re: Would someone please help me on a installation question ?


Random Joe and Neil, Thank you for your prompt reply. I know I need to supply some more information and I am working on that right now and I hope to have everything by tomorrow to post. Let me respond to what Joe had to say first. I'm not sured of the exact camera I will be using. I have a couple of digital surveillance cameras but they wont do. I could monitor maybe my front porch but they are not the kind of cameras that I could go online and view them. For lack of knowing the correct terminology I'll just say the camera has to have its own brain like a little computer with an IP address. I'm currently looking and if you know of a good one or even a good brand I will certainly look into it. I charge the batteries I have by bringing them home wiring them for 24volts and I charge them all at once. I dont really know if thats a good thing to do though. I do know that it is a pain in my backside. They are located on a shelf in my tack shed. That shelf is about 7 feet off the ground. I wanted them up and out of the way. Just getting them down is a real chore. They are some heavy batteries. I think I may need to replace them though because they just arent holding a charge like they used to. I am only running one 12 volt off road light to light the inside of my tack shed at night. It gets used maybe 1 to 2 hours a night and by the end of the 4th day its struggling to give good bright light. It seems like I am constantly taking them down, charging, puting back up and I know there has to be a better way. I just don't know what it is. I hope this makes sense. I thought that the batteries would last me atleast a month before charging. I just want to set it up once and let it be self sufficient with a solar charger. If I need to buy new batteries so be it. I'm not a rich man but whatever I need to set this up right I will buy. I just dont want to be throwing money out the window by getting the wrong parts and then setting it up wrong so I came to this forum because from what I have read you guys know you are talking about and I believe I could trust your advice. Most people I have talked to already are just trying to sell me something and send me on my way. they cant tell me the why this needs to be done or how they are calculating their answers. A rocket scientist I am not but I think I can judge when someone is blowing smoke up my rear end and all I have seen is alot of smoke. Sorry to get so long winded. Now would led lights be a better choice as far as lights go. I would just like something that puts off good light but consumes as little power as possible. Now neil you mentioned as did Joe that the power needed to charge the batteries would swamp the little power needed for the cameras. Isn't it possible to put something inbetween the power going to my light and the power going to a camera to regulate their power needs and have solar to charge the battery only without it having any bearing on what I am running? Also you mentioned a highly regulated walwort. May I ask what a walwort is ? I believe I can follow your guys advice as long as I know what you are talking about so please bear with me if I ask some questions at times in order for me to really understand what you are saying. To regulate the on and off I want to have a switch, located outside my tack shed, that I can instruct one of the ranch hands to turn off. I wont tell him he is turning my cameras off as I dont want anyone knowing that there is a camera but I will tell him something. Neil you also said I have alot of power with these batteries. Do you think I could accomplish what I am trying to do with maybe 1 or maybe 2 batteries that would be more practical then what I am using? If so please let me know. I dont care if I have to start from scratch and replace everything. that is if you guys dont mind spending the time and letting me know what I should get and how I should install it. Wow thats alot of typing for me. Im a two finger hunt and peck typer. I hope to have some information tomorrow on a camera . Thank You all for sharing your knowledge and your time helping me.

RandomJoe

Re: Would someone please help me on a installation question ?

When I said the battery needs would "swamp" the camera needs, I just meant if you size a solar array to give proper charging current for the size battery bank you have then you won't have ANY worries about the cameras. Even if a camera pulled 1A 24x7, that's 24 AH. But your 700AH battery bank "ideally" needs close to 70A charging current, and "at least" 35A. You'd replace the 24AH used by the camera in 1 hour of charging the next day! So no problems there. (And I'd be surprised if the camera required that much juice all the time.)

For cameras, I've been impressed with the Axis line, but they are pricey. Then again, any camera that sees well at night and especially if you want to be able to remotely aim it (they call that "PTZ" - pan-tilt-zoom) is a lot pricier than the indoor webcams. I have a couple D-Link webcams that I've put up, but they're blind by dusk. They were about $70 each, the Axis can run upwards of $1,000 for some models! Haven't bit the bullet on those yet...!

http://www.axis.com/

An aside, you may also be interested in a program called 'Zoneminder' - http://www.zoneminder.com/ - it is a Linux-based security-cam software package that can monitor multiple cameras. You can set zones for each camera where the software detects motion then starts recording. You are then able to go through the recordings and see what happened. You work with it through a web browser, so it's completely usable remotely. If you have multiple cameras, it even gives you a many-small-windows display like in a big security room! Of course, it requires you have a computer running somewhere, but it can pull the video from a remote camera so the computer could be in your house.

LED lighting would be the lowest-power, but it's hard to find good general-area lighting that doesn't cost a fortune. Best bang for the buck is to use fluorescent (whether strips or CFLs) although they may not work very well for you in an unheated space if it gets very cold.

Back to the solar requirements, a bare-minimum system to maintain your battery bank would be in the neighborhood of what I have installed, my system gets up to 30-32A charge current in full sun. It consists of 540W solar panels (I used four 135W Kyocera panels), an MPPT charge controller (I used an Outback FM-80, bit of overkill but I planned to expand) plus the associated small stuff (breakers, fuses, wiring, mounting rack for the panels). The panels and charge controller cost in the neighborhood of $2500! Double the panels to get closer to "proper" charge current, although the FM-80 would still be usable for that.

If you had that in, you could light the tack shed like daylight and have no problems whatsoever! :cool:

Now, if your batteries are getting weak and need replacement anyway then the better solution would be to properly size your battery to your loads. Let's say you get a power-hog camera of 1A and let it run 24x7, so 24AH. And let's say your off-road light draws 60W (I don't know what they pull!) so that's 60W/12V = 5A. Run for two hours is 10AH per day.

Your loads, then, total 34AH per day. A good rule of thumb is to size a battery to handle 3 days of no charging (heavy clouds or whatever) and you don't want to go below 50% discharge on the battery. That would be 34AH x 3 = 102AH, x 2 = 204AH. Quite conveniently, the golf cart batteries we often talk about using here are usually 6V 220AH, so you could get two of those and series them together and be set. They are also well suited to the task.

To keep them charged, you want to hit "ideally" 22A (10% of total size) and "at least" 11A (5% of total size). That's pretty straightforward, 22A x 12V = 264W - but panels are rather optomistically rated, so to be safe you need to pad that or look for the panel's "real world" rating ("PTC" rather than "STC" - my panels are 135W STC, 95W PTC.)

This is going to be plenty to cover your power requirements, but the calculation to check is easy too. Here is where you have to know your "solar insolation". Depending on where you are on the world, you have more or less hours of "full sun" each day. (Note this is NOT just "it's light outside"!) There are some tables and calculators available online, but (sorry!) I don't remember where they are right off. They will give you three numbers. Max, min, and average insolation. In your case you will want to use minimum (wintertime) to be sure you're covered.

I'll use my insolation to continue the example. Here in the OKC, OK area it is 4.9 in winter. So in your situation I would need to replace 34AH in 4.9 hours or 34AH / 4.9H = 6.94A so 7A of panels. Battery charging is inefficient, you will want to add some extra in for that. Different people like to use different amounts, up to doubling it. However, in this case, even just x1.25 lands you right at the low end of the desired charge range for the battery bank. So targeting anywhere in the 11-22A range for the battery bank will handily cover what you use for your loads.

If you are way north, where there is little sun in winter, you may need a lot more panels to keep things topped up!

Once you know how much solar wattage you want/need, then you can size a charge controller for that need. You also don't need to spend nearly as much as I did for a charge controller. MPPT is nice if you have long wire runs from the panels (can wire them for higher voltage and let the controller bring it down to the 12V battery bank) and to eke out every watt possible. But simpler PWM charge controllers are a LOT cheaper and will do the job well.

That's a bit rambling and rushed. About to head out the door to work! Hopefully it helps and makes some sort of sense to you!

System2

Re: Would someone please help me on a installation question ?

Joe you should be a teacher. It all makes perfect sense to me and I can't believe that I actually understand it all. I'm in the middle of dinner here so I'm going to digest everything you have said and attempt to figure out a game plan. I will be back later tonight. Thank you so very much!!!!!!!! By the way I'm in sunny San Diego, Ca.:D

niel

Re: Would someone please help me on a installation question ?

jw,
leds are good, but are not as omnidirectional or as natural as some like. you may want to try one to see if you'd like them. the larger ones tend to cost quite a bit more than compact florescents may, but florescents don't like cold or high humidity. incandescents (regular bulbs) are very power hungry for the amount of light given.

a wallwort is nothing more than an ac wall adapter.

there isn't an easy way to regulate the 12v from the batteries that would suit the camera off hand. most regulators require a few volts over the desired voltage to operate. there is the option of zener regulation, but this is unsuitable where leds in a camera may change the current drawn and you aren't that familiar with electronics to diy it. maybe a buck/boost regulator may fill the need (suggestions or ideas here guys), but may be overkill on costs for 1 camera.
what i did was buy a used computer backups from batteries plus for about $30. the new battery they put in it actually costs more than this. you are only interested in the inverter though as you could wire 12v power to it by making connections to the wires that go to the battery on the inside. they usually have spade connections btw. the beeping on mine can be shut off and it can operate independent of any 120vac input. it's an old internet office 500 if you are wondering.
if you go with the ups idea and you are unsure of a source for some pwm regulated wallwort supplies, they can be gotten at (deleted by niel due to trouble with company)
and you choose what level of current you'd like to utilize.
some examples are the ps-ad1, ps-12vdc1amp, and the ps-12vdc1.5amp
in your choice, try not to go too close to the top end of the supply's rating.

RandomJoe

Re: Would someone please help me on a installation question ?

Niel brings up a good point I didn't mention before. I've been trying to run as much as possible directly off my 12V battery bank here, and there are definitely some things you can do so with, but others that aren't happy. You may find it's much better to use an inverter (or the UPS, as Niel mentioned) to power the camera.

I have a stack of Linksys gear for my Internet and network connections that is happy directly fed - but then, all the "12V" wall warts were putting out around 14V anyway when measured under load! (A 12V battery system is going to - hopefully - reach about 14.2V daily.) They also run just fine at the low end - I've seen them operating okay at 11.5V or so.

However, I have a couple of items that have 12V power adapters but aren't happy at that voltage. Most notably my Eee netbook, as I had hoped to replace my current more power-hungry "off-grid PC" with one. It has a 12V input but the adapter is a well-regulated switching supply and someone else here tried running theirs off the solar system direct and got the "smell of toasty electronics"!

For something expensive like an Axis camera, I'd be inclined to go with an inverter or UPS and use the supplied wall-wart or power supply. My Linksys boxes, in addition to being fed 14V anyway, are cheap!

If you go the UPS route, be sure it's 12V! (Assuming you want to stick with a 12V battery bank.) I have some surprisingly small units here that actually have two batteries inside, wired 24V. But any of the "personal" ones designed for just a single computer are probably 12V.

A nice side effect of using an inverter/UPS is that you can now run other small AC items if you need/want. You may find - as so many of us did - that your loads and power needs start growing once the power is available!

vcallaway

Re: Would someone please help me on a installation question ?

Does your camera support PoE?

That typically is 48v DC carried across the Ethernet cable. The device connected to regulates down to what it needs. It is 48v because of the voltage drop typical of small ethernet cable. My phones for instance only need 5v. So long as I have > 5v at the connector the phone works.

As for the EEE. I bought a car cord of ebay for mine. Turned out to be garbage. I could run the computer but it would not charge the battery. I wound up just using an inverter in the car.

niel

Re: Would someone please help me on a installation question ?

you guys are making an assumption that he is in the market for a camera as he may have already purchased one or that he was willing to spend big $ for a camera.
no matter what he still has to utilize the batteries he has to power this and those batteries need charging that he wishes to use solar for. imho, he can use 2 of those batteries for the camera and lights and get enough pv for a 5% charge rate to them or about 17.5a and this is about 300w of pv. in about 2 hours this would fully charge two of the batteries in the presence of full sun based on the 34ah drawn randomjoe sites. you may even get away with 250w of pv and this would increase the time needed to replace that power used, but remember that you could get a string of cloudy days that the good sunny days would need to replace. if he still wishes to use all 4 batteries then he needs 2x more in pv to charge them.

RandomJoe

Re: Would someone please help me on a installation question ?

niel wrote: »

you guys are making an assumption that he is in the market for a camera as he may have already purchased one or that he was willing to spend big $ for a camera.

Not really an assumption, because in his second post he asked:

johnwayne wrote:

I'm not sured of the exact camera I will be using. I have a couple of digital surveillance cameras but they wont do. I could monitor maybe my front porch but they are not the kind of cameras that I could go online and view them. For lack of knowing the correct terminology I'll just say the camera has to have its own brain like a little computer with an IP address. I'm currently looking and if you know of a good one or even a good brand I will certainly look into it.

Thus I suggested Axis - not because they are the only option, but because that's the only cameras I know anything about (and like) other than the ultra-cheap not-usable-outdoor webcams.

Again, I don't know anything about the myriad other brands of cameras out there, but from the limited browsing I did when looking for some, anything that's going to work outdoors at night AND be usable remotely via network connection is going to cost a fair amount.

niel wrote:

no matter what he still has to utilize the batteries he has to power this and those batteries need charging that he wishes to use solar for.

He also said:

johnwayne wrote:

I think I may need to replace them though because they just arent holding a charge like they used to. ... If I need to buy new batteries so be it.

Thus why I suggested if he plans to replace the batteries, instead go for some smaller ones sized to the load he wants to run. Otherwise he needs a lot more PV to keep up the current set.

niel

Re: Would someone please help me on a installation question ?

i stand corrected on the 1st point and agree with the 2nd.:D

rj,
would you mind pming me on with info on the digital cameras as i am unfamiliar with them and their requirements, advantages, and disadvantages?