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Reuse DirecTv Dish Mount for Solar Panels

erictstahl

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Joined
Apr 25, 2021
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27
I was just removing an old Directv dish from my roof and noticed that it’s perfect for a solar panel mount. It’s well engineered, it can swivel and articulate (with degrees marked!) and it’s already attached to my roof. They are probably easy to find for free. Just remove the dish and the receiver arm.
 

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Looks pretty sturdy to me.
So, what do you do? Bolt some plywood to it and fasten your PV panel to that?
 
Agreed with both of you. Just a panel or two attached to plywood and then attached to this to power a battery or some lights.
 
Agreed with both of you. Just a panel or two attached to plywood and then attached to this to power a battery or some lights.
I suppose that depends on the size of the panel. my 345w panels are 2 m sq. considering that mount was designed for a dish that was like 2' in diam I would stick to pannels that were not much larger than that. Dont know what you'll do with a 50w panel but I guess it will charge a cell phone etc.
 
I mounted 3 small 15w panel to one for backup Ham radio emergency battery charging. Works great!
Off Grid with a 5.4 KW array now but still use it to keep trailer / quad batteries topped off. Just did a frame to mount the 3 small panels.
 

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Last edited:
I have 2 160 watt panels on a direct tv mount bolted to my shed. Been up there for a few years.
 

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