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Jb

Teeny tiny off grid system

Whenever I or Mrs JB do stuff outside we always run out of daylight and end up lobbing stuff back into the shed anywhere because we can't see what we're doing. The solution ... the teeny tiny off grid lighting system.

First off the lights ... one old piece of shiplap and some light fixtures from ebay for 99pence.



Then the main expense, a battery, £12. That's for a 12V 7Ah battery.



In situ, all a bit ropy and the workings are all on show but this is just a tinkering project.



Wire up a few bits, using anything I can find in the electricals box. Hence the bare strip connectors and bathroom pull to control half the lights



Now a couple of solar panels. Freebies I acquired which were what inspired the idea. These are meant to be used as as solar trickle charges so should be fine.



A bit of butchery on the connectors.



A few extra wires to connect the solar panels.



Panels attached to a rough frame and hooked over the top of my wee boy's shed. Not an ideal position but it's sunnier than my shed and I can move them later.



And it works!



The lights are 12V 4W leds so running all of them from a 12V 7Ah battery should work for about 5 hours. They're wired as two pairs so if the battery isn't up to it I can halve the power requirement. The panels together are about 8W so could charge the battery in 10 hours (ish). Measuring it I found they were quite far short of that which might be those panels or could just be the nature of all solar panels. But even at 10% efficiency it would generate enough charge to run one pair of lights for about an hour.

Was it worth the effort when I could have just used a torch? Of course not, but I had the panels for free and wanted to tinker Wink
OtleyLad

Watch the batteries. Most die an early death if repeatedly discharged more than 10% capacity (even so-called deep cycle batts).

Well done though, it's a worthy thing to do.
OtleyLad

Watch the batteries. Most die an early death if repeatedly discharged more than 10% capacity (even so-called deep cycle batts).

Well done though, it's a worthy thing to do.
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