Solar charging with some shade
I'm facing west today, so I'm getting a pretty good shadow on one of six series-connected panels. Panels are all around 135w @ 12v. Shade is on the far-left panel - about half of it: No...
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Once you connect, the controller picks its Vmp and you get an actual flowing Imp, which depends on the wattage. If wattage is fixed, and Voc and Vmp are different, then Isc and Imp will be different amounts. But before you connect there is no wattage because no current?
In this statement lies the answer for understanding the relationships of power produced and how it's effected by shading. When the series string is shaded the wattage is not "fixed" but at a dynamic level due to the shading.
You can toss around all the solar nomenclature but the output of the shaded array will be diminished, especially so if the array is a series string.
I hope I'm helping with the chicken and the egg but I get a headache from theoretical things, occasionally. Come on over and talk to my kid about whether photons, which have no mass, are effected by gravity. :E
Instant headache on that.
