Has anyone actually used or is using reflectors or mirrors to solve shading?

[rcrracer]

If shade similar to Andy's off grid solar garage, shinny AL window screens might work. A few layers with spacing between to homogenize the sunlight.

 

[underdog5004]

I've laid out a white poly sheet on my lawn in front of some panels which are mounted near vertically. In the testing I did limited testing the panels output without the sheet was 800 watts and with the sheet was 900 watts so that was about a I was a small increase.

I was kind of in a hurry before but now I have time to expand. This was a roughly 1800 watt solar array tilted near 60° where optimal is 30°, I'm optimizing for winter angles. There is a large indoor growing community here where I live. It is common knowledge that mylar reflective foil creates hot spots on the plants and otherwise unevenly distributes light whereas white poly tends to diffuse and reflect light more evenly. That's why I suggested using the white poly instead of the mylar foil, for better light reflection distribution. A mirror may work better but as someone else said it has to be adjusted, whereas the white poly sheeting tends to reflect in a diffuse way requiring no tracking. There's a dual benefit that this poly sheeting 6 mil thickness also helps keep the plants down in front of and underneath the panels.

 

[JWLV]

Mighty hard to put 10 panels in one spot

You do realize that if you put multiple mirrors in a 1m sq spot and you point those mirrors across several of your panels, you'll still get 1m sq of sunlight. It would be the same if you put a solar panel of the same size in the same spot.

 

[Crowz]

Ok I solved this

I just have it switch to battery right before the shadows hit the panels each day and switch back to grid after the trees stop shading the panels. Then the solar charges the battery back up

Won't be an issue when I get enough batteries to run on batteries all the time but this solved the problem for now.