Camping recharging setup

[LinearL]

Hello CPF!

Complete neophyte here seeking the wisdom of others.

A few years ago I bought a Brunton solaris 12W solar panel to take on camping trips and fully intended to get a few accessories until the $ ran dry :shrug:. Now that I have a little extra cash I'd like to finish off my mobile power kit and would greatly appreciate the opinion of the CPF knowledgeable.

I'm considering the Brunton Resync 9000 and Nitecore i4 G2 to finish out my little kit.

For the most part I'm going to be recharging eneloop AA and AAA's but I do have a few gizmos that use RCR213's...not to mention my Garmin Rino 530HCx and Iphone (I admit to being deeply in love with having my entire library of music with me at all times).

I'm aware that the Maha MH-C9000 and La Crosse BC-1000 seem to be the picks of the litter as far as chargers go, but neither seem ideal as a camping charger (I dont need an at home\use-all-the-time charger). Frankly, other than the $-flow problems, another big reason I didn't finish my travel power kit a few years ago was that I wasen't all that thrilled with my options. I be happy to pay over 100$ for a more rugged (and perhaps more reliable) version of the i4G2, but, if such a thing exists, I havn't been able to find it. As far as the Brunton Resync goes, I only settled on it because its a Brunton and I figured they had their own solar panels in mind when they designed it.

A big problem is that my power-source is a solar panel and have had a difficult time gleaning how a solar charging set-up would best be accomplished so that utility is maximized.

I've been enjoying this forum very much (y'all helped me pick a mini-flashlight recently :twothumbs, Fenix LD01 R4 if you're curious).

Thanks all!!!

 

[Teobaldo]

Hello.

You could use a USB charger AA / AAA as the Sanyo SEC-MDU012AAN and ML102 Li-Ion. Connecting the car lighter outlet to which put an adapter for USB would have power to run these chargers. I've done it and it works fine. I do not recommend connecting the 12 V output to any device, solar panels usually provide more than that (my Brunton Solaris 6 reaches 18.5 V). To do this you would need a Step-Down DC converter to ensure a steady flow of voltage needed.

Finally I chose to store energy in a power bank and, from this, energize the necessary chargers to avoid any possible restart of the charge produced by the variation in voltage. This is preferable to standardize charge connections to USB (a great invention in my opinion), all of which are above the recommended chargers.

My configuration:

Solar panels:
-Brunton Solaris 6
-PowerFilm Rollable 13

Power Banks:
-Ruinovo 102 1A 2x18650
-Ruinovo 402 1A/2.1A 4x18650
-QIDIAN QD-184-SX 3A 4*18650 dual USB and adjustable voltage in 5V, 5.5V, 6V, 6.5V, 7V, 7.5V, 8V, 8.5V, 9V, 9.5V, 10V, 10.5V, 11V, 11.5V, 12V, 12.5V, 13V

Battery chargers:
-ML102
-Soshine SC-S7 Ni-Mh/Li-Ion
-Cheap USB AA/AAA charger

With Qidian can energize almost any device with 5-12V, including the Maha or La Crosse (I used it to run my Asus EEE PC 1000HA Netbook without problems). IMO, use a bank to energy storage is the best possible configuration.

Good luck in your search and let us know what you did last.

(Thanks to Google for their translator)

 

[lamarrk]

I would assume that the camping requirements would be just as good for power outage use.
We've been without power here for up to a week at times (tonados, etc.).

 

[kosPap]

Another option for chargers would be the ThruNite MCC-4 and the Xtar XP4 chargers

 

[hiuintahs]

It looks like the Brunton solaris 12W solar panel is just a solar panel without any battery storage or charge controller. Specs say a maximum 15.4v at 800mA. And that would be with direct pointing at the sun.

So, the panel is but one piece to a solar charging operation. The most reliable is to pump solar energy into a battery such as a 12v AGM deep cycle type of battery and then run your lithium ion or NiMh chargers off of that 12v system. The 12v battery has to have a charge controller in-between it and the solar panel.

I imagine the reason people get these portable foldable panels is that they want something light weight. And of course an AGM battery isn't so light weight. Now you can run a 12v lithium ion charger directly from a solar panel if you can find out from the manufacturer of such charger that it can accept voltages a lot higher than 12v such that it will not harm the charger.

 

[ChrisGarrett]

Yeah, I didn't suggest the SLA/AGM mother battery route, because he stated 'camping,' but if he's car camping, then a nice 12Ah cell can be had for $25 and weighs about 8#. Of course, the Li-Po 9Ah devices are a lot lighter, but three, four times the price.

Chris

 

[LinearL]

Thanks for the suggestions...I will happily spend a few hours researching the chargers and power banks.

Please forgive my lack of depth as far as knowledge of the transferring and storage of electricity goes, but I had thought the Brunton Resync 9000 would function as a power bank\mother battery. My bare understanding of what I'm trying to do is this: My Solaris 12 provides a variable amount of power due to factors like cloudiness and the angle of the sun hitting the panels, etc, and because of this it is necessary to charge a "big battery" (powerbank\motherbattery)--ie the resync 9000--which is built to soak up this variable power and use it to provide more regimented juice for the smaller batteries used in cellphones, as well as running a battery charger for AA's and what-have-you. My assumption (I posted this thread in order for y'all to correct my potential misapprehensions) was that the resync was equipped with a charge controller of some sort; this based on accounts of how people used it in their reviews of the product.

Forgive me also for using the term "camping" so freely; I frequently forget that the idea of having a car with you and calling it camping isn't strange to some folks ;-) To clarify, when i said camping I really meant backpacking...no access to anything but what I have with me for a few weeks at a time. So in this particular example keeping weight down is an absolute priority. The total weight of all items I might possibly have with me (that require juice) isn't ever much more than about two or three pounds with batteries. I'd prefer not to add too much more weight as far as the charging apparatus goes and because of that I accept that it is not practical to expect to keep everything fully charged at all times. What I do want is the ability to charge efficiently on a limited basis so that I can prioritize a charging hierarchy, and can theoretically charge what I need when I need it assuming a little forethought on my part. This also requires that the items I take along have enough ruggedness to stand up to the day to day jostling of riding around on someone's back who might occasionally stumble over his own feet.

Thanks again!

 

[ChrisGarrett]

If you're backpacking, then weight is paramount and your Resync and a foldable/rollable panel will be mandatory.

Much like racing and horsepower, backpacking and weight is a function of 'how much can you afford to save?'

Chris

 

[hiuintahs]

OK, the Resync 9000 will work. The output is USB so all of your chargers need to be USB based.

I'm not familiar with the Nitecore i4 but I believe it to be 12v input only.

For NiMh (Eneloop) AA and AAA batteries you might consider the Sanyo SEC-MDU012AAN USB charger. It's $16.99 on Amazon plus comes with Eneloop batteries. I have one but have yet to test the amount of current it draws from the USB port. I always like to know what they do........especially when using it with solar system.

For a lithium ion USB charger, I use an XTAR MP1S where I modified it with my own circuit board. I really struggle with the cheap electronics that is in some of these chargers. The MP1S sells for $11 and the case or chassis is nice so that means there isn't any money in the control electronics........which is what I found out.

With the portable solar, you need to have chargers that can also charge at a low rate for the times when your solar system isn't putting out much. The MP1S was fixed at near 500mA so I made it a 200mA, 400mA, and 800mA charge selection to it. I added 3 leds to indicated which mode (low, med, high) it was in along with a micro switch. It's all controlled by a microcontroller and is very low power.

It seems that lithium ion is still in its infacy as far as good chargers go and especially for ones geared towards solar. For chargers I'm still working on some new designs. I'm also a backpacker and have a fancy with solar and see lots of posts on CPF requesting what to do. I'm also into emergency preparedness.