Solar Charging Scooters

(From J.R. Tozer) Want a way to charge your scooter for free? Check out the low-cost solar charging system described below. 

It looks like for less than $400, you can generate 60 watts, or about 400 Watt-hrs/day in your back yard. Since scooters use about 1 kW-hr of charge to go 10 miles, this would give you 4 free miles per day. Probably not near enough for heavy commuting, but maybe okay for errands - just a fun idea.

• Northern Tool 15 watt solar panel on sale for $80 (As of September 2007)
• Bracket, charge controller and wiring $69 (As of September 2007)

ROI

ROI?   Okay, so 0.4Kw/day * 300 days/yr * 30 yrs = 3600 kW-hrs over it’s lifetime for $400, which suggests about 10 cents per kW-hr generated – better than some high electricity rates - and no CO2 produced!

Complication

(Max Note) One challenge with this is that with silicone lead acid (SLA) batteries hooked up in series, the charging is much more sensitive than normal flooded lead acid batteries. If you overcharge SLA batteries, they will boil off some moisture and since you can't replace it, they will die quicker. Also, SLA chargers normally do a two stage charge where it first pumps them at constant current and then switches to constant voltage to make sure they all are charged completely. So a simple charge controller wouldn't be appropriate for SLA batteries.

Panels On the Scooter

Would you like to put the solar panels on the scooter so you can charge at work? Here is someone that did!

• Don's Solar Scooter