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Using solar power in the obs.
I have a bee in my bonnet about power bills and have recently decided I would try to convert my obs to 100% solar power. But I'm not a sparky and so am not as conversant with the various measures of power and current as a sparky would be. So of necessity, this will be a bit of suck-it-and-see.
I've got 2 x 100AH deep cycles in series running a 1500 Watt PSW inverter. The batteries are fed by solar panel(s) (2x12 VDC in series) on the hot-room roof. I only have 120 watts up there at the moment but since the obs doesn't get used every day, It just may be enough. Anyway, we'll see.
For the moment I plan running an NEQ6 mount, SBIG STF8300 ccd and controlling it all through a desktop PC.
Its all wired up with suitable gauge wire, each link from panels to inverter is fused and pretty much as it should be. The issue really will be how long the batteries will last before they get down to about 2/3 charge which I'd guess would correspong to a voltage of about 24.1-2. I'd see that as being the sensible cutoff point.
Any thoughts?
Peter
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