How to Build a Basic Solar Panel Part 2
Solar Panel box preparations
In this segment, I show my my rough-finished platform on which my solar cells will rest.
The casing is an old plastic shelf from an indoor/outdoor shelving unit. This was free, and there are several more of these sitting in a barn not being used.
All in all, I hope to squeeze 20 3*6 .55V 3.75A cells into this platform.
When all is said and done, I should be well under the dollar per watt range.
Hopefully, this panel will put out 11-12V at around 40 watts. I wish I could have fit 2 more cells into the casing, which would have guaranteed over 12V, however that would be impossible without damaging the structural integrity of the casing.
Let’s do some math. I paid $63 for 44 cells, tabbing,buss wire and flux shipped from MLSOLAR.
That’s $1.43 per cell. I’ll use 20 cells in this panel, for a total cost of about a little less than $29. As I said earlier, I hope to get 40 watts out of the panel.
All materials will come from recycled items, and I’ll keep a bill of materials of anything else I may or may not spend money on.
This was shot with a Cannon T3 under low-med light.