New Solar Battery Box by Torklift

RoyB wrote:
A typical 10WATT SOLAR PANEL manufactured in solar panels factory will develop around 15-17VDC@ 0.5 AMPS of usable DC Current when in high sun. AMAZON sells 10WATT Solar panel for around $39

PROGRESSIVE DYNAMICs says to charge a 12VDC DEEP CYCLE BATTERY that has been run down to 0% CHARGE STATE which is around 10.5VDC will require 14.4VDC @ 17-20AMPS DC current to be able to recharge to its 90% charge state in a quick three hour time frame. Even this will take a good 11-12 hours of charge to get to its 100% charge state.

It looks like to me the small 10WATT SOLAR PANEL is a bit on the small side. If you was lucky enough to even be in the high sun for the rule of thumb of 6 hours high sun available each cloudless day will only produce around 3AHs... A typical 12VDC battery is rated around 100AHs. The GP24 12VDC Batteries that are usually delivered with our trailer is rated at 85AHs.

The 10WATT SOLAR PANEL only possible purpose in this application would be to a trickle charger for the battery in the box. With only a 0.5AMP DC OUTPUT it would be a weak trickle charge at best...

Having looked up the specs and said all of this I think it is a great idea but it would not replace any of my standard battery charging procedures built-in to my trailer..

The smallest parasitic current drain your trailer has will overcome this 0.5DC AMP charge source. The only time this would be useful for trickle charging your battery would be sitting in a storage mode with a battery disconnect switch operated to totally disconnect the battery from the trailer system. This trickle charge would only be used between the regular required standard charging times.

The only experience I have ever had was with a small rechargeable back yard motion light which used a 7-watt solar panel I think it was. It worked for a couple of season as I recall. When the battery finally wouldn't charge up anymore I discarded it...

Just my observations...
Roy Ken