Math has never been my strongest subject.

[alanwestport]

I have too many moving targets for me to get my solar, charger and battery needs calculated correctly. I hope someone here who knows this stuff backwards and forwards will do me the favor of telling me what to buy for my customers project so I don't under or over-spec it. If you sell what I need and are in Southern California I'll buy from you if you are priced competitively.

The job is a 4 camera recorder with 4 cameras attached. The job is a remote 5 acre area located in San Juan Capistrano in Orange County California (Rough GPS coordinates: 33.5**********, -117.7**********) There is no power. There is an elevated large water tower with no obstructions hence a clear shot to the south. That we'll attach to at the top. The recorder runs on an AC to12 volt, 2amp transformer. The spec sheet only says the consumption is <10 watts. The cameras (4) are 12 volt and draw 3.6 watts with the infrareds on in night mode. I'm thinking treating that number for the draw 24/7 would make sense. Lastly there is a small wifi hotspot that I don't have the power supply specs but has a 4400 mAh Li-Ion battery that I will find a small 12 volt cigarette charger for. So the question is what panel and battery would I need to ensure this thing will run reliably even if there is no sun for 4 days which is rare around here (hence the fires This whole kit and kaboodle will be mounted on a 6 foot length of 6" schedule 80 pvc. The recorder and battery will be in a watertight electrical enclosure so I'm thinking a battery that needs venting would be out of the question. Please, if you do the "maths" for me and tell me what to purchase, I will be forever in your debt. Alan

 

[upnorthandpersonal]

Let's assume:

Recorder: 10W running 24/7 -> 240Wh/day
Camera: 3.6W x 4 24/7 -> 346Wh/day
Hotspot: assume 10W 24/7 -> 240Wh/day

Total consumption 826Wh/day. Let's round it up to 1kWh/day.

Need for 4 days autonomy --> 4kWh usable battery pack. Assuming AGM/SLA battery, somewhere around 8kWh (50% usable for long cycle life). Assuming LiFePO4 closer to 5.

You probably want to be able to charge the battery again in a single day after depletion of a 4 day run. Assuming 5 hours of direct sunlight, you could do with about 2kW of solar panels.

All this is worst case scenario. You can probably do with less. You probably also want to power everything with a DC/DC converter and skip an inverter.

 

[alanwestport]

Let's assume:

Recorder: 10W running 24/7 -> 240Wh/day
Camera: 3.6W x 4 24/7 -> 346Wh/day
Hotspot: assume 10W 24/7 -> 240Wh/day

Total consumption 826Wh/day. Let's round it up to 1kWh/day.

Need for 4 days autonomy --> 4kWh usable battery pack. Assuming AGM/SLA battery, somewhere around 8kWh (50% usable for long cycle life). Assuming LiFePO4 closer to 5.

You probably want to be able to charge the battery again in a single day after depletion of a 4 day run. Assuming 5 hours of direct sunlight, you could do with about 2kW of solar panels.

All this is worst case scenario. You can probably do with less. You probably also want to power everything with a DC/DC converter and skip an inverter.

THANK YOU THANK YOU AND YES THANK YOU! My customer thanks you too.

 

[upnorthandpersonal]

I do hope someone else comes along this thread and gives some additional input/discussion - just in case I missed something (it's late here). So don't go out buying stuff just yet

 

[Dzl]

(Gps if you care is 933.**********, -117.**********)

I believe you just gave us coordinates to the exact location of your GPS down to the nearest picometer ?

That number of decimal places would impress even @smoothJoey (the current reigning champion of decimal places ?)

 

[snoobler]

Here's your available solar:

Month	Solar Radiation	DC Energy
	( kWh / m2 / day )	( kWh )
January	5.22​	143​
February	5.51​	137​
March	6.45​	172​
April	6.84​	177​
May	6.48​	175​
June	6.31​	163​
July	6.7​	178​
August	7.08​	185​
September	6.87​	173​
October	6.1​	161​
November	5.69​	149​
December	4.92​	137​

That's for a 1kW system with panels tilted at 33° and facing 180° with solar exposure from sunrise to sundown.

 

[alanwestport]

I believe you just gave us coordinates to the exact location of your GPS down to the nearest picometer ?

That number of decimal places would impress even @smoothJoey (the current reigning champion of decimal places ?)

LOL! My math skills may be dubious but my cut and paste skills make up for it!

 

[Hedges]

LOL! My math skills may be dubious but my cut and paste skills make up for it!

You've told us almost everything we need to know, but one detail is missing.
We know what sort of security system is installed.
We know the precise location.
All we need to know now is what valuable item your customer is protecting.

This forum is available on the web.
I suggest you delete (or ask a moderator to delete) the PII, in this case coordinates.

 

[Dzl]

You've told us almost everything we need to know, but one detail is missing.
We know what sort of security system is installed.
We know the precise location.
All we need to know now is what valuable item your customer is protecting.

This forum is available on the web.
I suggest you delete (or ask a moderator to delete) the PII, in this case coordinates.

Edited to rougher coordinates.

 

[Hedges]

Edited to rougher coordinates.

Almost. You left the quoted version of full coordinates in your reply.

Or maybe he was swatting us. I can't see the water tower he was talking about.

 

[mmdb]

Your nvr recorder will use more than 10w +hdd consumption +calculate cameras minimum 5-6w each

 

[alanwestport]

You've told us almost everything we need to know, but one detail is missing.
We know what sort of security system is installed.
We know the precise location.
All we need to know now is what valuable item your customer is protecting.

This forum is available on the web.
I suggest you delete (or ask a moderator to delete) the PII, in this case coordinates.

LOL. No need for that to have been done but good looking out. My customer is a large commercial landscaping company. Think over 70 4 man trucks not counting the arbor care division. My customer has forever been paying to have his clippings and tree trimmings hauled to the dump and then pay dump fees. He was then buying stained mulch to use a ground cover. So in other words he was paying for 2+ rolloffs a day to be dumped. He found 5 unused acres (hard to do in OC) to have his own yard to dry the clippings and chip the limbs to make his own mulch. He's turning trash into treasure and saving $$. The land was a defunct nursery so it's zoned properly to boot. He likes to keep an eye on his empire and make sure everyone is working and CYA in case there is a workplace injury. There is a $300k chipper there that can grind an entire tree but it's been immobilized. I appreciate all of the feedback everyone here provided but once I started doing the math on the panel and battery cost I decided to look for a simpler solution. I found a nifty and well reviewed solar powered camera (reolink go) that uses a sim card for data transmission. It ticks all of my boxes except one. I have all of his various locations viewable on a single 65" LCD that allows him to see each location as a tab with the matching recorders. They utilize a "central station" software package. I cannot add these to that software, but I do have a workaround. Thanks again everyone. Alan