Sailboat Solar Questions

System
System Posts: 2,511 admin
in Solar Beginners Corner #1
Good afternoon everyone, I am very new to solar installations, and I need some direction. I just bought a 37" Sailboat that I am getting ready to sail back to the Virgin Islands. The boat has a Xantrex 10 Charger and a Xantrex link 1000 monitor?Inverter. It also has 4-6volt Batteries making up its 24 volt system. It also has a seperate battery for the starting of the deisel engine. I will be running Refridgeration, Radar, Autopilots, but now all the time, and I have switch everything over to LED lighting. I am trying to see what I need for making up an easy, solar charging system. I have a stainless steel arch over the stern of the boat that would be perfect for mounting 1 large panel or possibly 2 small ones. I was thinking of something in the 125 watt range. I dont need to replenish every bit of energy used every day but I would like something that is reliable and effficeint. Thanks for all your help in advance.
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  • Cariboocoot
    Cariboocoot Banned Posts: 17,615 ✭✭✭
    #2
    Re: Sailboat Solar Questions

    Welcome to the forum.

    Do a search for "sailboat" on the forum search. There are several threads including some dealing with mounting difficulties.

    To determine how much panel you need, you have to know the Amp hour rating of those batteries. Possibly they are Trojan T105's or the like: "golf cart" batteries. That's about 225 Amp hours. In that range you need quite a large array for charging:

    Minimum 11.25 Amps "peak" charge current (5% of battery capacity) * 28.4 Volts charging Voltage =
    319.5 Watts, less typical 77% derating = 414 Watts total.

    Are you sure it's a 24 Volt system? (All batteries wired in series). What sort of charging method is used now? Shore power only?
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  • mike95490
    mike95490 Solar Expert Posts: 9,583 ✭✭✭✭✭
    #3
    Re: Sailboat Solar Questions

    Welcome.

    The real world problems are:
    1) fragile glass. any bending or twist will break the glass and your $500 panel is toast.

    2) marine enviroment. Most panels are not warranted for marine enviroments. So you would be on your own, with no coverage.

    Then there is the problem with shadows, the thin shadow from any stay or lines, will cut down your power harvest .

    These aren't unsolveable, but they do exist.
    Powerfab top of pole PV mount | Listeroid 6/1 w/st5 gen head | XW6048 inverter/chgr | Iota 48V/15A charger | Morningstar 60A MPPT | 48V, 800A NiFe Battery (in series)| 15, Evergreen 205w "12V" PV array on pole | Midnight ePanel | Grundfos 10 SO5-9 with 3 wire Franklin Electric motor (1/2hp 240V 1ph ) on a timer for 3 hr noontime run - Runs off PV ||
    || Midnight Classic 200 | 10, Evergreen 200w in a 160VOC array ||
    || VEC1093 12V Charger | Maha C401 aa/aaa Charger | SureSine | Sunsaver MPPT 15A

    solar: http://tinyurl.com/LMR-Solar
    gen: http://tinyurl.com/LMR-Lister ,

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  • Elmer T
    Elmer T Registered Users Posts: 14 ✭
    #4
    Re: Sailboat Solar Questions

    Take a look in this section, "Solar Beginners Corner" and fine the Thread "Sailboat Application". It helped me alot with the same project that you about to do.

    Jeff
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  • BB.
    BB. Super Moderators, Administrators Posts: 33,660 admin
    #5
    Re: Sailboat Solar Questions

    Here is the thread:

    Sailboat application

    Another thread:

    low-amp system for small sailboat

    By the way, an easy method to search the forum is to use Google and the "Site:" tag--Works much better than the forum search tool if you don't know exactly what you are searching for:
    • Sailboat solar panels site:wind-sun.com
    Here is a Google search link.

    -Bill
    Near San Francisco California: 3.5kWatt Grid Tied Solar power system+small backup genset
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  • bmet
    bmet Solar Expert Posts: 630 ✭✭
    #6
    Re: Sailboat Solar Questions
    Paradisejeff wrote: »
    I just bought a 37" Sailboat that I am getting ready to sail back to the Virgin Islands.

    Spinal Tap, anyone?
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