I chose a rigid solar panel because 32
watts of charging was needed and the cost was 1/3 that of flexible
panels. While I've owned the panel many years and it has proven
to be the right choice in that it does keep my batteries charged while
cruising, it has failed to find a permanent home on the boat. It
has lived wherever a free space seemed to exist such as on the cabin
top bung'd in place but moved when the pop top was used, sometimes on
an empty cockpit bench, and sometimes strapped to a life
line.
The last location used hangers that allowed rotation. which hung it
from the starboard midship life line. That worked
as far as giving it a home where it wasn't in the way of movement on
the boat but it was visually in the way as well as not eye
pleasing. The real success with the panel besides it's charging
ability was fitting tennis
balls to the corners, which made the panel friendly to the
boat by eliminating the sharp corners.
For a long time, an eventual home of the stern was believed the
ultimate solution, perhaps on a gimbaled bracket to allow positioning
to
the sun. Every examination of those options produced either a
conflict with the open transom swim access or an aberration to look at
worse than a wind steering system.
A last look at the cabin top was taken, keeping in mind the
reasons it had previously been deemed not suitable.
- There is a pop top that hinges 1/3 the way from
the mast to the companionway and the solar panel doubles that distance
aft from the mast, the panel had to be moved to use the pop top
- The deck area there is uneven, and even with the tennis ball
corners on the panel, it wouldn't set flat
- The panel while rugged, wouldn't survive stepping on
the frame or panel without bending the frame and possibly rupturing the
epoxy of the panel
- While the panel is not to wide, it would slightly interfere
with reefing, especially when facing the boom, partly because of my
size 14 feet
- The
panel needed securing during heeling, which couldn't of course be
permanent because of the pop top and became trippers when reefing
- Lying flat, it couldn't be optimized to the sun position
With each of these problems in mind, new thought was given with the
following requirements.
- The panel needed a frame to give it structural integrity
adequate to stand on
- It had to be elevated to allow toe kick
- It needed secured without a bunch of lines on the deck
- It needed to make room for the pop top
- A
throw out was the positioning, the panel has proven to do a fair job
even without much attention to sun aiming... may have to do some
testing to see how much is lost... positioning is a problem because the
vang is only a couple of inches above the forepart of the panel
- It needed to be easily removed from the boat leaving no trace
of butchery
- It
couldn't interfere with either the all weather pop top enclosure or the
sunbrella pop top cover, both of which snap on all the way around the
pop top and hatch
Once the problems were clear, a solution emerged fairly
straightforward. If a wood frame base were provided, it would be
rugged enough to walk on and become part of the deck. Such a
frame could easily be elevated and doing that would solve the uneven
deck issue. Half way there. The pop top only required that
the panel be raised at the aft end, the forward end could
hinge, which would also provide the securing and there was an ideal
hinge point near ( the mast step pin). Lifting the aft end of the panel
to make way for the pop top would be very easy with a simple line and
cleat at the boom. The raised panel would not interfere with the
vang.
The following drawing has emerged
Project
scrapped... have been talked out of mounting on cabin top due to
shading and more difficult angular adjustment... but it was worth
taking a look at.
The current mount that I will stay with looks like this and hangs from
the midship life lines.
