parajared's solar trike attachment

[cycleops612]

Perhaps to clarify?

Generally, multi input controllers are hardly a new concept.

A green home may have a wind generator and PVs, both very different power and both combining to charge the same bank, managed by a single controller.

Similarly, many ebike controllers can charge a battery from a charger input, or from a regen input. It is a multi input controller, but not usually thought of as such.

Therefore, Maybe the PVs could be fed into that second input, in lieu of regen power from the motor?

 

[amberwolf]

The motor controllers don't have a second input for regen. It comes from the motor, on the same wires as the power goes out to the motor.

You might be thinking of the regen brake input as a place you could input power but that's not how it works--that would just be the switch (or analog control) that tells the controller to start doing regen braking.

 

[cycleops612]

The motor controllers don't have a second input for regen. It comes from the motor, on the same wires as the power goes out to the motor.

You might be thinking of the regen brake input as a place you could input power but that's not how it works--that would just be the switch (or analog control) that tells the controller to start doing regen braking.

thanks. I thought i had seen regen wires on an ebike controller photo & i guess i assumed they included current inflow leads.

still, why not multi input ebike controllers?

handy for combining differing batteries for one thing. a lipo and a tired bottle battery e.g.

 

[craneplaneguy]

Perhaps to clarify?

Generally, multi input controllers are hardly a new concept.

A green home may have a wind generator and PVs, both very different power and both combining to charge the same bank, managed by a single controller.

Similarly, many ebike controllers can charge a battery from a charger input, or from a regen input. It is a multi input controller, but not usually thought of as such.

Therefore, Maybe the PVs could be fed into that second input, in lieu of regen power from the motor?

Separate controllers are needed, though the same type controller can work for both wind, solar, or hydro input, you can't use one controller for 2 inputs.Pretty sure of that, not mppt controllers anyway.

 

[cycleops612]

Perhaps to clarify?

Generally, multi input controllers are hardly a new concept.

A green home may have a wind generator and PVs, both very different power and both combining to charge the same bank, managed by a single controller.

Similarly, many ebike controllers can charge a battery from a charger input, or from a regen input. It is a multi input controller, but not usually thought of as such.

Therefore, Maybe the PVs could be fed into that second input, in lieu of regen power from the motor?

Separate controllers are needed, though the same type controller can work for both wind, solar, or hydro input, you can't use one controller for 2 inputs.Pretty sure of that, not mppt controllers anyway.

so it seems. thanks. FYI (in an offgrid context)

"It would be very likely that having mulitple types of sources for a single MPPT will not work at all well for you...

MPPT basically looks at the equation Pmax=Imp*Vmp and tries to play around with I and V to get Pmax.

If you have multiple power sources (wind, solar, and generator) all connected to the input of a single MPPT controller--there is no one place on the power curve where a single Vmp and Imp will give you maximum power for everything.

Also, some devices (such as Wind Turbines) have very different I*V curves and responses--A standard solar charge controller would (my guess) have great difficulties in trying to figure out the opimum power point and track it...

Also, solar PV panels can be "turned off" without any problems. A wind turbine typically needs a load to prevent over-speed / self-destruction. There is no way a single controller can take all three inputs at one time and have anything work well."

 

[craneplaneguy]

Hydro is also a problem, like wind, when disconnected from a load. Like a wind turbine the hydro turbine can speed up and self destruct when unloaded! Both my wind turbine I now have, and my micro hydro, that are grid tied, have large "dump loads", just big heater coils, to keep things under control when the grid goes down. Solar is so simple and pretty much idiot proof a lot of people don't get how desirable it is. I tell people in their 40's and 50's, when I sell them some solar panels, "you'll have these for the rest of your life."

 

[cycleops612]

Hydro is also a problem, like wind, when disconnected from a load. Like a wind turbine the hydro turbine can speed up and self destruct when unloaded! Both my wind turbine I now have, and my micro hydro, that are grid tied, have large "dump loads", just big heater coils, to keep things under control when the grid goes down. Solar is so simple and pretty much idiot proof a lot of people don't get how desirable it is. I tell people in their 40's and 50's, when I sell them some solar panels, "you'll have these for the rest of your life."

alternately put, ~every solar panel ever made still works, sorta at least, and its been a fair while now.

btw, a quote for others here:


"You haven't been keeping up with new solar technologies. The cheap widely commercially available stuff I used would weigh about 12 lbs without the rack to make 240 watts and likely the stuff Marissa used is the much more expensive ultra thin solar film. However the really cool solar panels are the ones that the solar race teams are using. Instead of just exploiting the visible light spectrum they also collect energy from the infrared and ultraviolet spectrum as well."


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_car_racing"

 

[parajared]

Another alternative to a solar charge controller would be to custom build your own solar panel. You can buy individual cells scrapped from larger panels that were damaged for quite a lower price than buying an entire panel. My battery (12s hobby lipo) fully charges at precisely 50.4 volts so basically I would just serialize solar cells until I get a panel voltage that is exactly my battery peak charge voltage (about 100 or so in series according to my calculations @ .5volts per individual cell).

I presume that would work fine and would charge slow too as it reached peak charge as the panel voltage sags a little under load.

 

[ddk]

Another alternative to a solar charge controller would be to custom build your own solar panel. ...

LOL I started to build a panel just for that reason, but since I was, at that time, running 10S it was just as easy to use 2 twelve volt panels in series (open circuit would be 40+V) I tested a variety of controller methods btw. From networked Blue Sky MPPT controllers to iChargers directly connected to the panels,
I ended the trike experiments with a simple dc-dc converter and a bank of DPDT switches and a couple of meters because that was so much simpler to deal with.
Because I use 2 banks of batteries, one per motor, I added one more bank as to always have a load for the panels to charge.
But then again, by this time I lacked ambition to ride the trike for more than a couple of hours per day so the panels now form a porch for my workshop, feeding the MPPT controllers charging a bank of 12V lead acid AGMs that power most of the shop, the smart chargers and a 10A dc-dc I use to bulk charge.
I currently charge 7S, 8S, 12S and 15S battery packs and the 300W of panels have performed adequately.

 

[parajared]

I have decided to re-build the solar trike attachment to hopefully get rid of the floppiness, lower top-heaviness, lower weight and more closely mimic Francis Cottard's design


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7U1OMemZbS8