ScorpionKing said:
Justin, at Recumbent Cycle Con which is put on my Recumbent and Tandem Magazine, we has a presentation by Azub where we saw some pretty terrible road conditions in some of the area's you are going to be traveling in. Are the Solar Panels working out as well as you thought they would?
Electrically for sure. When the angles are right (ie we are heading in a northerly our southerly direction and can tilt the panels to fully face the sun) we'll see 400-450 watts often enough.
With clouds it's really interesting and varied. There are times when the sky is covered in clouds without a blue patch in sight and yet we're getting like 300 watts on the panels, with tons of diffuse sunlight still making it through. Other cloud filled skies which appear to look just the same only allow 80-100 watts of power in. However, when you look straight up you can normally feel the difference on your face between these two cloud situations.
When the clouds are darker grey, then it drops down to 20-30 watts, and when we have rain clouds bearing down (which has happened a LOT the past 4 days) the solar drops to near zero, and then we seek refuge under the panel for rain protection.
However the best condition is not a clear blue sky but a cloudy sky which happens to have an opening for the sun to shine through. Then you end up with both the direct solar light from the sun, PLUS all the diffuse light from the adjacent clouds. At one stage after a rainy morning in Italy we saw over 590 watts from our 550W peak panel.
It was like magic, literally the silver linings of the clouds doing this. Sadly the circumstances for this are normally short lived.
The converse situation is also true, if we have a clear blue sky with just a single cloud in front of the sun, then we end up with like 30-40 watts, much less than if the entire sky was cloudy. Luckily these situations don't last long.
Structurally the roof has been holding up decently well given the total last minute and untested nature of the foam+fiberglass construction. When we assembled it in France I was short one M4 nyloc nut so only put 1 rather than 2 screws on one of the front supports. That came back to bite me since the shock on the front of the roof caused this one screw and washer to puncture through the thin fiberglass wall so it's not really holding it securely, and then the roof could bounce and it the support structure here which has caused the fiberglass rib to crack a bit and no longer holds the edge of the panel totally straight.
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View attachment 3
The other 3 attachment points are all fine. My plan was to reinforce this damaged mount with some sheet metal but now that we have the large 2.8" front tires, the shock on the roof even with bumpy roads is so much less that it's not really getting any worse.
Also, where the two halves of the roof join in the middle there is now a noticeable sag at the joint so it's not totally flat across the top. It's not a bit detail but I'm likely going to use a strut and string to do some triangulation to pull the mid section upwards a bit.
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And finally, the roof tilting mechanism initially had two hand turn knobs for locking or unlocking the rolling wheels, but these were M5 threads in an aluminum plate and I forgot to grease them before the trip. At some point in Croatia the rear adjustment became seized as the aluminum/stainless galled, and then when I unscrewed it all the threads shore off.
So we're now using tools to loosen/tighten the roof for pivoting and have to stop and dismount for that which is annoying compared to being able to adjust it while riding.
Are there improvements you would make to the setup?
Suspension! More USB charge ports, easier to access camera holders, and retractable side curtains off the roof that we could pull down for better water protection during heavy downpours. And a better job of having organized stowage containers for all the various odds and ends so that we can be faster and more efficient about packing/unpacking or getting supplies (like sunscreen, duct tape, gronala bar, a USB charging cable etc). We've been making additions and modifications the last few days and will be doing more today as we wait in Sofia for a care package from Grin to arrive.