Quick Question!

[alex281]

Hey all, its been a while since i posted, but im just about done with my system (Pics Soon!)

But i have a quick question. for my tiny 100 gph pump and small air pump, would a 100watt solar panel connected to a 12v battery run the system? its pretty sunny down here in LA. If it can, what about a smaler solar panel , lets say 50 watts? whats the lowest i can go or basic requirement. i might be expanding in the future, but right now i just wanna know the present energy i need for what i have.

Thanks!

[wh33t]

All you gotta do is calculate your energy requirements.

If you have a 100watt solar panel, what it really means is that it will produce 100watts per hours in optimal conditions (which basically never happens). Let's assume you get 75 watts (I dunno, even that might be a bit high but I have no personal experience with solar energy) per hour during the day when it's light out. So however many hours there is light that's how much total wattage you'll be producing. You could also hook up a battery to power it through the night time if your panel is capable of powering the pump and the air pump and has excess energy left over to charge the battery.

So if your 100gph water pump is 22w and your air pump is 5w well that means every hour the total energy you need is 27w. Something a 100w panel would easily power. So if you had a 100w panel producing 75watts for 12 hours a day and then fell back on a battery to power the equipment during the night I would guess that your panel could power the equipment during the day and also recharge your battery.

Just keep in mind every time you convert from dc to ac and ac to dc you take an efficiency hit of a few % at least. So if it's absolutely critical that your pumps don't shut off due to lack of power you should "over build" your energy requirements. You could do that, or you could also just spend a little extra dough and get straight up 12v DC water pump and air pump (check out marine equipment and such for things like this).

If you go the battery route also be sure to get a battery charger that auto-shuts-itself-off when the battery is full (and make sure it works).

I'm not a pro with any of this stuff, but I see you had a quick question and no one gave you a quick answer yet so hopefully this helps get you started in some kind of useful direction.

Peace!

[alex281]

All you gotta do is calculate your energy requirements.

If you have a 100watt solar panel, what it really means is that it will produce 100watts per hours in optimal conditions (which basically never happens). Let's assume you get 75 watts (I dunno, even that might be a bit high but I have no personal experience with solar energy) per hour during the day when it's light out. So however many hours there is light that's how much total wattage you'll be producing. You could also hook up a battery to power it through the night time if your panel is capable of powering the pump and the air pump and has excess energy left over to charge the battery.

So if your 100gph water pump is 22w and your air pump is 5w well that means every hour the total energy you need is 27w. Something a 100w panel would easily power. So if you had a 100w panel producing 75watts for 12 hours a day and then fell back on a battery to power the equipment during the night I would guess that your panel could power the equipment during the day and also recharge your battery.

Just keep in mind every time you convert from dc to ac and ac to dc you take an efficiency hit of a few % at least. So if it's absolutely critical that your pumps don't shut off due to lack of power you should "over build" your energy requirements. You could do that, or you could also just spend a little extra dough and get straight up 12v DC water pump and air pump (check out marine equipment and such for things like this).

If you go the battery route also be sure to get a battery charger that auto-shuts-itself-off when the battery is full (and make sure it works).

I'm not a pro with any of this stuff, but I see you had a quick question and no one gave you a quick answer yet so hopefully this helps get you started in some kind of useful direction.

Peace!

This was the exact answer i was looking for thanks!