Hi Everyone,

I'm new here. Thanks for a great site to share ideas!

I have two 45 Watt systems up and just purchased 2 more yet unboxed. I also purchased a SUN-300G Grid Tie Power Inverter from ebay.  I have the 6 panels (90 watt total) tied in parallel to the inverter and was getting 80 Watts on a fairly cloudy day measured with a killawatt meter. I was pretty happy with that! The meter seems to be reading intermittently though. I suspect some incompatibility with the inverter.…

I put in a solar hot water heater a few years ago with used parts and a modified 50 gallon tank. It works great. I bought a open box single panel at Harbor Freight yesterday. I would like to use it to drive a attic gable fan.

Hello everyone. I just joined this forum. I been buying the Harbor Freight 45 Watt panels now for about 3 years. I buy them when ever they are on sale. I just bought 2 more this weekend. I now have 100 boxes or 300 panels. As soon as it cools off here in Fla, I'm going to start mounting them on my roof. My roof position is great. I get the late morning sun and all the afternoon sun. The roof angle is close to 30 degrees.

I'm now looking for deep discharge Marine batteries. I…

Hello,

I purchased a Harbor Freight kit and really enjoyed it, so I purchased another. Both have worked fine but I have determined that I want to go bigger. I have stepped into the realm of building my own panels. I found a great deal on tempered glass, $10.00 each 18" X 56.5". The size of my glass has restricted me to 45 3" X 6" cells. It took a while but I have figured out how to solder the cells together with tabbing wire and no additional solder. I wired them in series.…

Hello All,

I decided I would try out the blog section. This is just a bunch of random thoughts I'm tossing out in the form of a letter. I've learned a bit this week and thought I would share.

First... I had my battery bank setup with bus bars. A guy in our maint. shop at work cut me some bars out of stainless bar stock. I drilled the needed holes at my shop at home and installed the bars. I thought it all was working very well. I was talking to another maint.…

Picked up another single 15w HF Panel today. I'll install it horizontaly over the other two singles.

This should give me about 4-5 amps on good days peek hours. The singles come with some extra hardware, disconnect wiring & 3 adaptor connections. Also if I consider or need to…

I have been a little concerned about the amp draw and recharging time needed for a system that is on the compact side. So I thought it would make sence to know how many amps different things I run actually draw on their own or together. At some point I may have an amp meter in line or a better controller but untill I cross that bridge I'll make use of a multimeter.

Here's a video that helps explain how to do it, the guy is a little hard to understand but it makes sence starting at…

My name is Bill, and I have just joined the Forum.  I am presently preparing a small lot in San Felipe, Baja California for my 1951, Spartan Trailer.  My trailer is in Redlands, Ca being renovated before. I take it down.  The lot is completely off the grid, and water is brought in by truck and stored in a cistern.  It is my intent to use a bank of HF panels to supply my electricity with a small (3000 to 5000 watt) generator as a backup.  Since you'all are the experts, I hope to pick your…

I started out with solar just looking to keep the Jeep battery topped off & charge a few double and triple a batteries now and then with the dc adaptor (12v plug). I have a camp located off a seasonal road, no grid. With very little traffic near by a vehicle with a dead battery can make for a bad day. So I picked up a 15w panel and a 7amp controller thinking the research about charging and room to expand would pay off. Earlier this year (2011) I restored an older woodsman camper…

Hello everyone, Just joined the group. Have been playing around with solar for a while now. I own three HF solar panel kits, and am getting ready to mount them on a rack and place them on the roof of my shop. I will be charging backup batteries and running ham radio gear. I live in

El Cajon, Ca. were there is a lot of sunshine. For my first question; how many HF solar panels can one Have?    Mike

Ever since the dawn of time, we have as a people have wanted to harness some of the Sun's power. Utilizing solar to gather energy & then storing it in a battery is the way to go.Years ago I myself got into this self reliance thing, I started out with 1 Harbor Freight system and 1 battery. I was in self reliant heaven, burning led lights along with buying 12 volts items that if I didn't even need them now, I might need them  later. Then I didn't think I had enough power, so what did I do,…

I was hoping that some of my good friends here on the Harbor Freight Solar Kit Forum were doing some gardening and would visit our newest site The Tucson Bucket Garden and share some input on what we are doing with our water saving gardening technique.

Our first six buckets are in the ground and our adventure with growing veggies in bottomless buckets is happening! Not only does it appear to be saving a TON of water…

I have many idea's for some projects.

I completed my HF 6 panel GTI to just suppliment my home…