Solar Tracker Project

[Xringer]

The Red Rock Tracker came in today. It's a very small, neat little package.



Those LEDs are Large! The highest part is the MOV? disc between the FETs.



The bottom of the PCB is super flush. Not one wire hanging down!


Sat the PCB on some anti-static foam and pegged the single screw hole with a bamboo peg.



The PCB is so deep inside, I'm not sure the LED angle is going to see the sun correctly.

It was late when I installed it, but when connected, it tried to track the sun
between tree limbs. It moved West a few times..
So, I guess the motor polarity is correct. (I had a 50-50 chance).

I tried putting a cover over the glass, to see if it would track home (east),
but had no luck. It went more westward and stopped. No sun..
No voltage on the motor either.

We shall see if the 'Home' function is working when it gets dark..
Just pulling a cover over the glass didn't work for me..

Edit: Aug 8 2010
Mostly cloudy all day! I wrong on the motor wires! Reversing them got it tracking better..
Not real accurate, maybe because the sun never really came out for very long today.

It did go the Home(east) posistion tonight!

I'll update this tomorrow, (Friday) since it's going to be a nice sunny day..

[Xringer]

Friday wasn't that great (for solar tracking), but when it was sunny, the Red Rock was tracking pretty well.
But, I did notice a bit of lag at times. The tracking would fall behind about 10 to 20 degrees.

So, last night, I made some simple anti-glare mods.

Inside, I added black tape over the white foam & added a thin rubber divider between the two detector LEDs.

On the outside, used some black stick-on Velcro strips to block the light reflecting off the inside edges of the white module's bezel.
From reading the forums, I suspect that reflected glare might effect the operation of the LED detectors.




Today, the results of the mods have been very gratifying. In partly cloudy conditions, the tracker has been mostly dead-on. When it does lag, the shadow post only shows a 1/4" shadow.

I have noticed a little motor reversing, after some westward moves.
It's a very short burst, and might occur because of mount swaying.
The motor is being pulsed, so the SOC of the Fios battery is staying high.

I'm really starting to like this little Red Rock board!!

~~~
Edit: 8-8-2010
I spoke too soon. The Tracking is off again. Clouds easily confuse the unit and it gets lost.
Once it's real over-cast, the tracker starts slowly moving eastwards. (Thinking it's night?).
And once it's over too far east, it doesn't see the sun when it comes back out..
The board is too deep down inside the module. I'm going to need a better housing.
An enclosure with a wide-angle view of the sky..

Now, I know why the plastic peanut butter jars seem to work so well..

[Xringer]

Originally Posted by Xringer

Well, the J-B weld epoxy didn't work.. It's coming apart, making the hot-plate over-heat..

It seems I need some real thermal conductive epoxy.. Otherwise, my wires are going to really melt..

~~~

I've been thinking about this problem, and wondering if it would be better
to use an inductive heating system??

Induction heating

Design a flat coil, based on the inductive cooking surface design, and place it
face-down on top of the boiler.?. It's made out of magnetic steel..

[NiHaoMike]

Could you use a spring to hold it in place?

[Xringer]

I don't think so.. But that gives me an idea. I have some small lead bars that
I could stack on top of the resistors.. Lead should be okay, since the resistors
are never going to get up to 621.5 °F.. (I hope)!

please Xringer
I need a Photo of the back side board
thanks

[AC_Hacker]

Xringer,

Too bad you can't convince your wife that solar panels on the roof are pretty.

It looks like your front roof slope would give you a great solar exposure. No need for a tracker either.

If you set the panels parallel to the roof slope, you'd loose a bit of energy, but the appearance would be better.

The biggest plus is that the panels would shade your house and reduce your 24-7 AC use.

-AC_Hacker

[Xringer]

Originally Posted by AC_Hacker

Xringer,

Too bad you can't convince your wife that solar panels on the roof are pretty.

It looks like your front roof slope would give you a great solar exposure. No need for a tracker either.

If you set the panels parallel to the roof slope, you'd loose a bit of energy, but the appearance would be better.

The biggest plus is that the panels would shade your house and reduce your 24-7 AC use.

-AC_Hacker

I know.. That's where we had the old Novan hot-water collectors..
But, you should have heard her scream when I showed her this edited pic..


Now that the summer is coming to an end, we are cutting back on our 24-7 Sanyo use.
Even flipping-off the breaker to save heating the pump..
But, the humidity shot up to about 87% last night..

[AC_Hacker]

Originally Posted by Xringer

But, you should have heard her scream when I showed her this edited pic..

Too bad.

Here in Portland, that would be considered a status symbol.

-AC_Hacker

[Xringer]

Originally Posted by kyros

please Xringer
I need a Photo of the back side board
thanks

Sorry, I do not have a photo of the back side. And, I think, I understand why you want it.
MTM has asked me not to disclose the circuit diagram (which is in the provided manual).
And he explained his reasons. So, I will not be posting a back-side picture.



After my experience using relays and learning how quickly they wear out,
I can't really recommend using a relay based solar tracker for serious use.

If it's just for a school project and not intended for long term use, relays should be okay.
But, in real world use.. It seems relays aren't reliable enough.

Check out this page for info about relays compared to FETs.

Electronic Projects There are dozens of diagrams here, and a lot of interesting reading.

Now that I'm using FETs, I will never go back to the relays.
My MTM board would buzz the relays off-&-on thousands of times a day. When there were clouds, it was worse.
Sunlight coming between the leafs of a tree? BUZZZZ! It was frustrating.
The only thing that will make this board acceptable to me, is an FET H-drive circuit to replace the relays..
(Plus a well regulated power supply)