If a solar panel puts out: 180 Peak Watts, 26 Peak Volts, & 7 Peak Amps- Is this per hour? And how does this translate to the layman?
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Those are all instantaneous values. The solar cell will output (at most) 180 watts (power) at peak sunlight hours. It will be less at any other time. In relative terms, that means that under peak sunlight, if you had 5 or 6 of these panels, they would generate enough power to operate a kettle (or a microwave, or toaster or anything with similar power requirements). Although you would need some extra electronics to actually run most things (although a kettle or toaster might work as is).
If you add panels in series, then the voltages will add and the current will stay the same. If the panels are wired in parallel, then the currents will add but the voltage will stay the same. In either case, the output power capability should increase as more panels are added.
watts are a rate. It produces 180 watts as long as the sun is bright enough.
Look at this way, 180 watts is enough to light a 100 watt bulb and a 80 watt bulb. If and when the sun is bright enough. More typically, it will put out 100 watts or less.
.
Watts is a rate and you multiply it by hours to get energy.
Be advised that those ‘peaks’ are just that.
Don’t expect those levels to occur for more than a short period on a clear day.
Just as a guesstimate you could expect to charge a 24V. battery system to
the tune of about 700W.Hr.s per day on average from this panel if it was well sited.
Hey Stat, solar panels are listed in peak watts, which is the open circuit voltage, or peak volts multiplied by the short circuit current, or peak amps. In practice you never have access to this entire 180 watts. Some new charge controllers, called MPPT for Maximum Power Point Tracking get pretty close though. If you took that panel and hooked it to a 12 volt battery, it would still peak out at 7 amps, but the panel voltage would track down to the batteries charging voltage, somewhere between 12 and 16 depending on its state of charge. If it were at 14 volts, fairly typical, at 7 amps, you would only be yielding 98 watts. These numbers are not per hour or any other time function. Watts, amps and volts are instantaneous. Watt hours, amp hours or kilowatthours are time functions of power. If you hooked that panel up as we indicated, and the battery stayed at 14 volts, in direct sun, you would get 98 watts. After an hour you would have put 98 watt hours, or 7 amp hours into that battery.
If you want to read more about this, there is a book in the library called, The Complete Battery Book, by Richard Perez that gets into the nuts and bolts. Richard Perez is the founder and editor of Home Power Magazine, another good reference. Good luck, and take care, Rudydoo