Starting June 9th, Enter to Win a 100W Solar Flex kit from GoPower! The kit includes a 100W flex panel, 30amp charge controller, and an MC4 cable. Click the banner to enter. Good luck!
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Go to part one of the install
Go to part two of the install
400 Watts of of pure sun power from GoPower!
In part 2 of the solar install, I was short one MC4 cable that I needed to wire in the front two panels. GoPower! quickly sent me what I needed and I got it wired in easily using my fridge vent Blue Sea feed-through terminals. Then I mounted the fridge vent cover. I put on these little plastic caps to keep the terminals from shorten out from something hitting them at the same time. Not that there should be any issue on the roof…
Solar wiring junction on fridge vent
I decided to hid all the wires with aluminum tape. I probably went a little overboard covering the MC4 bridge plugs. Now it looks like there is a “Jiffy Pop” on my trailer just waiting to vent some fresh popcorn!
I called up 3M about their VHB tape and my application. I asked them if the tape needed to be sealed against water or UV radiation and they answered, no it does not. So with that, I may not even seal the edges. They look so clean now with just the tape.
The tape does have a very strong hold that after 72 hours, total adheres at some crazy scientific molecular level.
Here is a profile shot of the clean edges.
You can’t even see these panels standing next to the trailer….
Update: I decided to go ahead and put Sikaflex 221 around the edges of the panels. Mostly to keep any water from getting behind them. Turned out fine.
Added sikaflex 221 on the panel edges.
Today I was able to do some more testing to see how much I can get out of the panels. Keep in mind that my battery is fully charged, so the panels don’t want to give up much.
I turned on my inverter, powered the TV’s and some lights, the fantastic vent, and finally got the solar up to over 20 amps! Wow, pretty sweet. I was drawing over 30 amps, but only 11 were coming from the battery bank. Not bad at all!
Nice. Over 20 amps from the four panels.
Go to part one of the install
Go to part two of the install
Here are the Amazon links to the flexible panels I used if you want to research them further.
1 – Go Power! (GP-FLEX-200) 200W Flexible Solar Kit with 30 Amp PWM Solar Controller
3 – Go Power! (GP-FLEX-100E) 100W Flexible Mono Crystalline Solar Expansion Kit
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