Simple cabling question

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SolarSid

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I'm new to the forum. Hello!

I'm new to solar power, and I've just bought a Eco-Worthy 120w solar panel and also a Anker Portable Power Station 521, 256Wh portable generator. I've mainly bought them to power some lighting in a shed, and also get into solar and learn more. But, I'm not exactly sure how to connect the two together, and obviously I'm cautious, as I don't want to damage either.

According to a question answered by Anker themselves on Amazon UK's website, the Anker Power Station has a MPPT feature, which I believe allows me to connect the solar panel directly to the Anker? So would I be a right to assume I don't also need to buy some sort of solar charge controller?

So if that's right, I think I just need a cable. The Eco-Worthy has two cables coming out the back, with some fairly chunky connectors on each, one plug, one socket, which I assume are pretty standard. The Anker has a DC in connector at the back.

So, hopefully the forum won't mind me posting Amazon links, but is this cable all I need to connect the two together?:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Energy-Storage-Battery-Connector-Adapter/dp/B0B1ZHLNHP
Thanks for any help!
 
+ve from the panel to the red cable. Not familiar with the rest of the gear.

Ok, red to red, thanks.

Looking at the listing again, it shows the cable going direct from a panel to a portable charging station, so it looks I can just directly link them, so I'm going to buy that, fingers crossed!

What are people's thoughts on 120w and Eco-Worthy panels, BTW? Haven't wasted my money, have I? What's the max wattage panels you can get, and do they work out cheaper (Paid £75 for the 120w one)?

Thanks!
 
Ok, red to red, thanks.

Looking at the listing again, it shows the cable going direct from a panel to a portable charging station, so it looks I can just directly link them, so I'm going to buy that, fingers crossed!

What are people's thoughts on 120w and Eco-Worthy panels, BTW? Haven't wasted my money, have I? What's the max wattage panels you can get, and do they work out cheaper (Paid £75 for the 120w one)?

Thanks!
Not used that brand, but should work fine. It's the sort of panel you find on caravans and motorhomes for battery charging.

You can get panels upto 600w these days, huge great things! I don't recommend trying to work with those. What matters most is the panel efficiency, anything around 20% is good.
 
Not used that brand, but should work fine. It's the sort of panel you find on caravans and motorhomes for battery charging.

You can get panels upto 600w these days, huge great things! I don't recommend trying to work with those. What matters most is the panel efficiency, anything around 20% is good.

Cheers!

Think the manual says 21%, so fair enough.

Incidently, does a solar panel's efficiency drop much with age?
 
Cheers!

Think the manual says 21%, so fair enough.

Incidently, does a solar panel's efficiency drop much with age?
Initial exposure sun, known as PID can drop it by upto 1%, after that it's around 0.7% per year. But I'm seeing figures less than that these days with some claiming only 10% over 30years. My own array has been showing outputs only 3watts lower than the max it's ever achieved this year. I think that's a lot to do with UV levels, plus I've been cleaning the panels more to take advantage of the weather. Dirt is probably more of an issue than degradation in reality on many systems.
 
Initial exposure sun, known as PID can drop it by upto 1%, after that it's around 0.7% per year. But I'm seeing figures less than that these days with some claiming only 10% over 30years. My own array has been showing outputs only 3watts lower than the max it's ever achieved this year. I think that's a lot to do with UV levels, plus I've been cleaning the panels more to take advantage of the weather. Dirt is probably more of an issue than degradation in reality on many systems.

That seems pretty decent. Pleased there isn't much drop-off. Thanks.

Ran into what could be a big snag with Anker power station "DC input (65W max)"

Problem is, I'm sure is if the solar panel supplies too much wattage, this power station:
a) Copes, and ignores the excess.
b) Trips out, but doesn't break
c) Breaks

Maybe that's what the MPPT's supposed to sort out?

So I got the cable and decided to take a chance and try it, anyway. Getting about 55w in 4pm direct sunlight.

A major disappointment I've discovered his how optimised the panel seems to be for direct sunlight. I've heard people say with solar "you don't need sunlight, you just need light", but I'm quite shocked how stark the difference between direct sunlight and light. At 5pm and no direct sunlight on it, it was struggling to output 1w! Very disappointed, and I think my usage for the panel is going to be far more limited than I hoped. I think it's going to be next to useless in winter, and maybe not that great in spring and autumn. Weirdly, even when I just moved my arm in front of it to create a shadow, only blocking maybe 10% of the panel, the panel output would go from 55w, to just 6w. Weird.

Are there panels about that are better optimised to create power from just light? If there are, I'm thinking they might be better for the UK climate.
 
So, you have discovered why we like grid tied inverters and putting panels on South facing roofs with no shading 😁

One point often overlooked is the current weather, with it being so hot panels do suffer heat saturation. My own 3.3kw system hasn't got over 2.3kw this week. You have also discovered why we are very much in favour of size, ie max out the panels in the space available. It's the only way to generate useful power over winter.

MPPTs don't protect the inverter, they try to optimise power from the panels
 
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