back to 2026.01.24 Winter Field Day Camp Ingawanis

6 solar and power:




I didn't take very many pictures of the solar/power for this event. The solar panels got set up after the start
of the event, although it was a bit slow going in the cold and powdery snow.

Normally I'd prefer to set up the solar panels on the South side of the cabin, but antennas were already being
set up just South and SouthEast of the cabin. Even with filters I can't set the panels very close to antennas,
so I decided to set out the panels to the NorthEast of the cabin, where the ground was still somewhat flat.
Although the ground was fairly flat, it was still sloped a bit. I used a car broom to clear the ~4 inches of
powdery snow in an area for the panels and then spread them out. The heavier panels were much less prone to
trying to slide away, although occasional wind gusts did sprinkle powdery snow on the panels from time to time.

Considering the limited space in the cabin and the very cold temps outdoors, I decided to forego setting up the
solar frames, and just laid the panels out on the ground. (after clearing the snow from a fairly level patch)
I also brought the heavier 4-pound panels to reduce the risk of wind flipping them and for the improved durability
in the low temps.

The solar collected a total of 585Wh throughout the event. which was respectably good. The South radio ran on
Al's (KB0VGG) big 400Ah lithium, while the North station ran on my (N0ZYC) 100Ah. Initially I only connected
the solar to the 100Ah battery, figuring the 400Ah would have no problem running the radio all event. To my
surprise, the 400 was dipping very low on transmit by morning, so I tied it in parallel with the North battery
and the morning solar.

I'm not sure what was up with the 400Ah battery. It read 14.4v at the start of the event (which seems a little
high to me?) but was dragging down to at least 12.6v on transmit by morning. This year's WFD rules required
the logging laptops to also be on alternate power if running the stations that way, and I did set up some 12v
desk lamps for overnight, so that did increase draw a bit from typical, but I didn't anticipate that much of
an impact on battery runtime.

Scott (W3STS) brought his portable power station (with its own foldable solar panels) although I don't think
it got used this time around.

Also, back at home after the event (when resetting my gear) I discovered two of the panel combiners had suffered
damage to their internal fuse holds and had to do some repairs on them. I'm not sure if those were the boxes
used this year or not. The fuse holders are rated 5 amps, and the panels won't produce more than 5.1 amps under
the best of conditions, so I don't know why they would have overheated.



panel combiner fuse problem (in mark 2 combiners)

2026.01.25 14.06.40	2026.01.25 14.06.46	2026.01.26 13.39.29

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