Hooking solar up to trickle charge your battery

[tcongdon]

I would like to hook up a solar panel system to trickle charge my 12v multi-purpose battery for my HiLo. What would I need and what are the specifications for it?

 

[JackandJanet]

I'm a little leery of "trickle chargers", because they don't know when to quit. They simply apply a small, steady charging current to a lead acid battery that is supposed to keep them at a full charge, but that actually overcharges them, causing the electrolyte to "boil off". To properly MAINTAIN a lead-acid battery, you need to use a "battery maintainer". There are two brands of these that I'm familiar with - Battery Tender and Battery Maintainer. I like the Battery Maintainer because it has a desulphating process and I use one on both of my vehicle's batteries when they are garaged. My car battery is 6 years old and in great shape. My truck is brand new. The maintainer plugs into house power and it uses very little current.

Now if you want to go solar, I suppose a 15 Watt panel might work, if it is always in sunlight. Personally, I'd put no less than a 100 Watt panel on the trailer and I'd run it through an MPPT controller that uses a 4-stage charging algorithm. I THINK this will not overcharge the battery but it will provide enough power to maintain the battery or, bring it back up to a full charge if discharged.

I still think a battery maintainer is the better choice for long term storage though.

- Jack

 

[tcongdon]

I'm a little leery of "trickle chargers", because they don't know when to quit. They simply apply a small, steady charging current to a lead acid battery that is supposed to keep them at a full charge, but that actually overcharges them, causing the electrolyte to "boil off". To properly MAINTAIN a lead-acid battery, you need to use a "battery maintainer". There are two brands of these that I'm familiar with - Battery Tender and Battery Maintainer. I like the Battery Maintainer because it has a desulphating process and I used one on both of my vehicle's batteries when they are garaged. My car battery is 6 years old and in great shape. My truck is brand new. The maintainer plugs into house power and it uses very little current.

Now if you want to go solar, I suppose a 15 Watt panel might work, if it is always in sunlight. Personally, I'd put no less than a 100 Watt panel on the trailer and I'd run it through an MPPT controller that uses a 4-stage charging algorithm. I THINK this will not overcharge the battery but it will provide enough power to maintain the battery or, bring it back up to a full charge if discharged.

I still think a battery maintainer is the better choice for long term storage though.

- Jack

I use the trailer converter to keep my battery charged now but electricity is going way up so I'm thinking I like to use solar at least when I'm not using power in my trailer.

 

[tcongdon]

I'm a little leery of "trickle chargers", because they don't know when to quit. They simply apply a small, steady charging current to a lead acid battery that is supposed to keep them at a full charge, but that actually overcharges them, causing the electrolyte to "boil off". To properly MAINTAIN a lead-acid battery, you need to use a "battery maintainer". There are two brands of these that I'm familiar with - Battery Tender and Battery Maintainer. I like the Battery Maintainer because it has a desulphating process and I used one on both of my vehicle's batteries when they are garaged. My car battery is 6 years old and in great shape. My truck is brand new. The maintainer plugs into house power and it uses very little current.

Now if you want to go solar, I suppose a 15 Watt panel might work, if it is always in sunlight. Personally, I'd put no less than a 100 Watt panel on the trailer and I'd run it through an MPPT controller that uses a 4-stage charging algorithm. I THINK this will not overcharge the battery but it will provide enough power to maintain the battery or, bring it back up to a full charge if discharged.

I still think a battery maintainer is the better choice for long term storage though.

- Jack

I thought a solar controller knows when to quit charging but I'm not that familiar with solar and controllers. The only solar I ever dealt with was a solar generator that the controller is already built into the battery and all I have to do is plug in the solar panel to charge it and I can use 12 volts or 110 from that battery. And I do use that in my trailer when I'm dry camping and that works great but I'd like to find some way to charge my battery without have to plug it in all the time.