Sale today on 12 Volt flexible solar panel

Glue on your tail boom and never charge your battery again.
https://www.solarblvd.com/product_in...oducts_id=3082

On Friday, November 25, 2016 at 6:10:24 PM UTC-5, Soartech wrote:
Glue on your tail boom and never charge your battery again.
https://www.solarblvd.com/product_in...oducts_id=3082

I would not do this. The temperature that will be generated under the panel is going to be very high, potentially weakening the structure. Those who glued flexible panels on top of their RVs know what I am talking about. I have seen melted flexible panels.

On Friday, November 25, 2016 at 3:30:23 PM UTC-8, Andrzej Kobus wrote:
On Friday, November 25, 2016 at 6:10:24 PM UTC-5, Soartech wrote:
Glue on your tail boom and never charge your battery again.
https://www.solarblvd.com/product_in...oducts_id=3082

I would not do this. The temperature that will be generated under the panel is going to be very high, potentially weakening the structure. Those who glued flexible panels on top of their RVs know what I am talking about. I have seen melted flexible panels.

This panel would be too large to put on a tail boom anyway (despite the quoted dimensions of 46x21mm!). They also imply that you can't bend this thing in an extreme way. On the other hand, the $/W is very good if you can use it in some non-aviation application.

Tom

Soartech wrote on 11/25/2016 3:10 PM:
Glue on your tail boom and never charge your battery again.
https://www.solarblvd.com/product_in...oducts_id=3082


At 21" x 46" x 0.125", it's too big and probably too heavy. We need
smaller panels to replace the no-longer-available STrobls.
--
Eric Greenwell - Washington State, USA (change ".netto" to ".us" to
email me)
- "A Guide to Self-Launching Sailplane Operation"

https://sites.google.com/site/motorg...ad-the-guide-1
- "Transponders in Sailplanes - Dec 2014a" also ADS-B, PCAS, Flarm

http://soaringsafety.org/prevention/...anes-2014A.pdf

Closest I found was www.lemo-solar.de

Why bother with solar panels when you can buy light weight lithium batteries with enough juice for anything you can imagine? Solar panels are from age of lead batteries.

Not exactly. I know a guy who has a radio, transponder, Butterfly vario, LX9070, S80, Flarm, V3 vario and a strobe built into the vertical fin, that can either act as a strobe or only strobe with a Flarm alert. All that stuff takes about four hours to go through one lithium battery with two factory installed solar panels topping up the battery. Good thing he has two and possibly three batteries (if he is not going to use the engine).


On Saturday, November 26, 2016 at 5:39:58 AM UTC-8, krasw wrote:
Why bother with solar panels when you can buy light weight lithium batteries with enough juice for anything you can imagine? Solar panels are from age of lead batteries.

Le samedi 26 novembre 2016 14:39:58 UTC+1, krasw a écritÂ*:
Why bother with solar panels when you can buy light weight lithium batteries with enough juice for anything you can imagine? Solar panels are from age of lead batteries.

Because you might have an engine in the back, and need all that lead in the nose?

On Saturday, November 26, 2016 at 5:39:58 AM UTC-8, krasw wrote:
Why bother with solar panels when you can buy light weight lithium batteries with enough juice for anything you can imagine? Solar panels are from age of lead batteries.

Besides effectively increasing battery capacity, they are very useful for recharging the batteries between flights. We are continuing to add electronic devices (transponders, flarm, foot warmers, etc.) while on-board battery capacity is stagnant. In some gliders, like the DG80x, battery capacity is already at a critical level (and lithiums are not an option). If I ordered a new glider I would definitely go with the solar option (assuming it is available with Strobls closing).

Tom

In some gliders, like the DG80x, battery capacity is already at a critical level (and lithiums are not an option). If I ordered a new glider I would definitely go with the solar option (assuming it is available with Strobls closing).

Tom

Same problems with the DG400. If anyone has worked out an elegant solution to add separate instrument batteries, please reply privately to

Kevin no space soar AT gmail dot com