diy solar

diy solar

Solar panels by dimensions/alternate sizes?

hour

New Member
Joined
Sep 26, 2019
Messages
125
Has anyone found a way of searching for solar panels by dimensions? It's a cumbersome process to open PDF, find specs, convert to inches, repeat 100 times.

Panels seem to be pretty standard sized in the 250-350w range. Panasonic HITs broke that a bit by squeezing 350w+ out of something ~62" long, so 2-3" shorter than some cheap 250w panels that clock in at 65"+ long.

Wondering if any company has shot for ~250w and done the same thing Panasonic did by reducing the footprint.

I have 2x100w renogy compacts on my truck's roof rack that occupy 20x40 each, so a 40x40" area side by side. I'd like to replace these with a single panel and get a bit of wattage boost. I can go as wide as about 42" and for length I'd like to keep it as short as possible, as every inch eats in to the only remaining roof rack space. This is the second setup I've had on the roof as it used to be 2x100 renogy non-compacts which were 20x47" each. Has any company accomplished something similar by knocking several inches off the length and keeping the output the same? The 62" long panasonics are hard to beat, but I don't need 350w and 62" leaves me little room at the end of the roof rack.

Edit: I can technically fit a third 100w renogy compact, which I own, but I neglected to install it when I upgraded from the 47" long non-compact panels. Reason being... mounting nightmare. I have supports running width-wise across the roof to support things currently, and would have to change to supports running length wise. I could stack those new supports on the existing width-wise supports but then the panels would be sticking out of the (yakima megawarrior) by several inches.

At present they're nearly flush with the top of the basket, don't catch any wind (flush with wind fairing), and look rather...sexy. At a 40x60 footprint, assuming I could manage to install the third up there, I may as well just ditch the basket and sell on craigslist - but my custom ultra low profile :LOL: mounting solution for the basket has resulted in a couple impossible to remove bolts, so it's a permanent fixture on the shell.


IMG_4610.PNG

solarside.jpg

IMG_3004.jpg

I've considered doing a sliding drawer affixed to the bottom of the supports seen in the above picture. The space beneath the existing panels isn't really doing much good, can't slide much beneath them and then securing becomes a nightmare. So it's basically dead space that could be utilized for this purpose, but I'd be bummed (heartbroken) to have to go back to running in parallel. I could add another controller for the third sliding panel, but as you can see in another pic I have a bed slide - so it's already a nightmare having my two PV wires do the accordion thing to avoid getting pinched. Unfortunately there was no good way to mount an enormous 200ah lifepo4 ammo can stationary. Bed slide: one of my least favorite mods.

draweridea.jpg

Sorry for blabbing, I can't even begin to tell you how many hours I've lost to playing around with this in my head and doing fruitless google searches. In between work meetings and killing time, figure posting this thread for possible leads is a hell of a lot more productive than toying it over for another year, staying up late unicorn hunting.
 
Last edited:
I ran into the same problem looking for panels narrower than 32". Im interested to see what others say.
 
I ran into the same problem looking for panels narrower than 32". Im interested to see what others say.
It's a giant PITA to research, "most compact solar panel 2021" and any similar search query on google seems to return a disproportionate amount of fluff sites with commissioned links to Amazon for 100w panels no matter how you word it.
 
I am looking for larger panels that are lighter than the norm for my Trailmanor travel trailer that is a aluminum sided popup style trailer using torsion bars to raise and lower. So weight really matters.
Searching for lightweight panels isn't easy either.
 
I am looking for larger panels that are lighter than the norm for my Trailmanor travel trailer that is a aluminum sided popup style trailer using torsion bars to raise and lower. So weight really matters.
Searching for lightweight panels isn't easy either.
I've also done that search in trying to plan solar for my pop up camper. I actually gave some flexible panels away on craigslist just because I hated the thought of mucking up my camper roof with tapes and/or glues and then having them fail. I googled the weight limit of trail manor campers and found a few posts implying that they're basically not designed to carry any weight and have additional challenges in terms of drilling/securing through the thin aluminum roof. Some guy on a trailmanor forum runs a 170w panel but I'm guessing you want more than that.

Maybe the EFTE laminated flexible panels (or whatever the latest craze is with no real world data to back life expectancy) would be an option for you. Solves the weight and drilling issue if you can commit to tape and glue. Costlier and you'd need a couple to amount to one large panel. Limited options / impossible problems sure do suck :LOL: Maybe you could figure out some light weight base to attach to the roof that allows hot-swapping flexibles should they fail.

I still question whether giving away $400 of panels was the right choice. My pop up fits in my garage so it's only out in sun for ~45 days a year. Not quite like the folks in Arizona who full time and experience flexible failures. If you store your trailmanor in the garage you could may never experience a failure. Or if you store it with a cover outside. Wouldn't get that sweet charge on your batteries just sitting there beside your house but you could throw a small, cheap, rigid panel on top when parked at home.

I know Renogy Eclipse 100w panels are lighter than the average at 15lbs, or used to be. Apparently my 100w renogy compacts are 14.3lbs? Not sure what perk that leaves to buying the eclipses. Anyway, hard to imagine that 60lbs - 400w - added to your roof would break something designed for road travel, wind, and protecting your noggin while you're inside. Again, not sure what your target wattage is.
 
Target wattage would be around 700-750 watts on the roof with another 600 or so in a ground setup.
Part of the roof already holds a 13.5k ac unit so the weight isnt really the concern, it is the torsion bars that raise the unit that would be marginal.
I could go to the factory and have higher capacity torsion bars added, but I have heard they are spendy.
I have no doubt that VHB tape would work fine on the roof and since the trailer is folded down during travel, there isnt much drag to loosen the panels from the roof. The best price to weight ratio of panels I have found so far are the Axitec AXIpremium HC BLK AC-320MH/120S 320w Mono Solar Panel from Solaris-shop.com 65.94 x 39.06 x 1.68 inches and 40.79 LBS, Efficiency 19.26% for $135 or about $160 delivered (if I bought 6)
 
Last edited:
Target wattage would be around 700-750 watts on the roof with another 600 or so in a ground setup.
Part of the roof already holds a 13.5k ac unit so the weight isnt really the concern, it is the torsion bars that raise the unit that would be marginal.
I could go to the factory and have higher capacity torsion bars added, but I have heard they are spendy.
I have no doubt that VHB tape would work fine on the roof and since the trailer is folded down during travel, there isnt much drag too loosen the panels from the roof. The best price to weight ratio of panels I have found so far are the Axitec AXIpremium HC BLK AC-320MH/120S 320w Mono Solar Panel from Solaris-shop.com 65.94 x 39.06 x 1.68 inches and 40.79 LBS, Efficiency 19.26% for $135 or about $160 delivered (if I bought 6)

Gotcha. Well, if nothing else, thanks for helping me find Solaris. They're like an hour south of me and had eluded all of my "wholesale solar colorado" searches and the like. The amount of trash results for anything solar related is just out of this world.
 
I understand your dilemma. I had the same problem. How to find a brand/model of panel that fix specific dimensions.

The System Advisor Model is an application that installs on a PC. If you dig deep enough into it, there is a huge database of solar panels, including dimensions. I don't know if that database is available outside the application. The database may be dated, so finding panels released within the past year, two years or whatever, may be hard.

 
I found a website that makes it easy to narrow down the choices in the marketplace for solar panels.
You can filter using power, efficiency, power tolerance and weight
 
I found a website that makes it easy to narrow down the choices in the marketplace for solar panels.
You can filter using power, efficiency, power tolerance and weight
Hah yeah that's actually the site that inspired this. Couldn't believe they didn't allow a filter by approximate dimension. Good news for your hunt though based on weight.

I posted this question on another forum and received this suggestion for connecting the third panel in series on demand, "a form “C” switch could be installed to include or bypass the third module as its deployed or stowed"

This was pertaining to putting the third panel on a drawer beneath the existing two panels. If I could find anything about this type of configuration I'd have something to go on, but can't find a lick of information about it. Once again, google is cluttered with bogus results - 99% trying to explain the difference between series and parallel.

But anyway, it'd be slick to slide the third panel out and flip a switch to incorporate it in to the series setup. Has anyone heard of such a thing?
 
If the third panel was paralleled, then there would be no need for a switch.
True, but was hoping to keep things in series as the controller can handle the voltage of 3 and I've noticed an improvement in charging (earlier in the morning, later in to the evening) since I went to a series setup some time ago. Goes easier on my existing wiring in to the truck bed, too.
 
When I just looked for panels of less than 200 watts, there were only about four or five companies I considered. Renogy, Sunpower, Ecoworthy were the three I really concentrated on. I got cardboard cutouts and put those an my roof to see the spacing.

The big thing that stopped me from the other companies, is once I looked at size of the panel vs output, there were 200 watt panels for cheaper than a 175 watt panel, and I realized that a lot of the E-Bay and Amazon panels were not advertising correctly.

After looking, I found these individual flexible cells you can craft into a panel that is whatever size you want. https://www.ebay.com/itm/Sunpower-S...833299?hash=item59250f0f53:g:g20AAOSwSqtcn~5K
Crafting individual cells into a custom sized panel is way much more work than I wanted to do.
 
I too found that smaller panels were more expensive. That prompted a change in design on my part. I think I ended up with a better solution.
 
When I just looked for panels of less than 200 watts, there were only about four or five companies I considered. Renogy, Sunpower, Ecoworthy were the three I really concentrated on. I got cardboard cutouts and put those an my roof to see the spacing.

The big thing that stopped me from the other companies, is once I looked at size of the panel vs output, there were 200 watt panels for cheaper than a 175 watt panel, and I realized that a lot of the E-Bay and Amazon panels were not advertising correctly.

After looking, I found these individual flexible cells you can craft into a panel that is whatever size you want. https://www.ebay.com/itm/Sunpower-S...833299?hash=item59250f0f53:g:g20AAOSwSqtcn~5K
Crafting individual cells into a custom sized panel is way much more work than I wanted to do.
Hah yeah I remember watching a video of a guy vacuum laminating (or something) custom panels back in the day when I was more gung-ho about DIY stuff. Would never consider it at this point, guy used a hole in the middle of his dining room table with a vacuum stuck in it. They're too cheap for the effort but that really would allow for maxing out a space.

I did find a way to achieve 240w in a 40x53" footprint. Would use 2 x Newpowa 120w 24v panels and cost $280. If I could find a single panel in this dimension I'd probably jump on it, but using two width-wise which would be required for these (unlike 2x100w pic on truck) and would involve an additional support bar and using my 100|30 MPPT instead of my 75|15 (~80v for the 2x24v). The time and cost to build, paint, and mount a third support bar would be too much trouble.. plus I'd have to use some weird uni/super strut brackets to mount 3 panels on 3 bars. Better to just get the panasonic HIT 340w @ 41x62 at that point. It did inspire a bit of hope though, if a company like Newpowa can give 240w in a 40x53 space (and double the framing for two panels), surely a company like Panasonic could do 250w+ for a single panel in the same dimensions if they felt so inclined - which they likely do not.

Of course 250w is the wattage where the standard ~39x~64" panels kick off
 
Last edited:
Back
Top