The location of the original solar panel. It had never worked while we've owned the Time and Tide.
The original panel was a flexible 10 watt bank of cells that had a pretty decent weather-proofing that would be good for sun and rain but not constantly immersed in water.
This is the fiberglass frame that held down the panel. Under this was a flat area with weep holes to drain water. Unfortunately the weep holes would collect "gunk" preventing the drainage of water and the panel eventually shorted out some time in the past (pre-December 2011).
Recent installation of a aluminum framed panel in the same location.
The panel is rated at 50 watts and easily keeps up with the refrigeration requirements of the crew on sunny days. The main reason though is to keep the house batteries "topped off".
No comments:
Post a Comment