Basic battery/solar question

[woodchuck acres]

Ok, I'm willing to admit that I have tried and tried to understand electricity and it always slips out of my brain. I'm sure this is a very basic question but if someone could explain it to me IN WORDS OF ONE SYLLABLE, I'd appreciate the help.

I have a solar energizer and battery that powers electronetting for my goat pasture. Seems to me that this could also be used to power other things, after all it really just charges a battery that then charges the fence. I realize this is dc and I do understand the difference between dc and ac. The specs are:
1-Patriot P5 0.5 joule low impedance energizer
1-12 amp hour 12v sealed lead acid battery.
1-10-watt solar panel

So could I rig this to charge or run something else?

Thanks for being very, very, very patient!

[grumble]

Take the charger apart and hook the leads that go to the battery to another battery? Not sure what it is you want to do with it. With separate leads out of the charger, you could probably run a small transistor radio when the sun's shining.

[MichaelK]

Hi WCA
Your little panel is putting out less than one amp at 12 volts. That's not even enough to run one single CFL for more than a few minutes.

Your battery is slightly larger, and when completely charged could run a CFL for two hours or so. You don't want to run the battery completely dead because that will sharply shorten its life.

You could use it to power a very low consumption appliance, such as an AM/FM radio or a LED light if it has a 12V power input.

A better project for you is to get one of those cheap Harbor Freight solar kits. with a coupon you can get one for 150$. They come with three 15 watt panels and two 12V DC lights. Throw away the charge controller included in the box and purchase a 7 amp controller for about 30$. Throw in a deep-cycle battery for 80$ or so and for 250-300$ total you can have something that will keep a few lights on for a couple of hours.
Good luck,
Michael

[woodchuck acres]

MichaelK--Thanks, that makes sense to even me, I have looked at the solar kits from Harbor Freight, sounds like a reasonably priced experiment for the electrically challenged1

[12vman]

As stated above, the 10 watt panel is only going to provide ~.6 amps in full sun. Giving it a usual 4 hour charge period, that's only 2.4 amps harvested. I'm sure that the fencer gives it a considerable load within the parameters of the panel and wouldn't give you much elbow room for any other loads to connect to it.

I looked the unit up. (Current consumption: 45 mA.) Figure this for a 24 hr. period. (1.08 aHr.)

http://www.enasco.com/product/C29284N?ref=recent

You have a 12 aHr. battery. You can safely use 3 aHr./day. (25% maximum discharge rate) The fencer uses 1.08 aHr. in a day. This would only leave you 1.92 aHr. to play with to keep the battery discharge rate within 25%. BUT, if you look at the charge the panel supplies on a "good" day, it doesn't replace the 25% used from the battery! (2.4 aHr.)

The fencer system is pretty balanced and only designed to operate itself. Even on a cloudy day , the panel can replace an amp or two to supply the fencer and not totally drain the battery below 25%. Adding any extra loads to it will surely cause problems..

[woodchuck acres]

12vman,
I wasn't thinking of adding an extra load. I was thinking more along the lines of winter when the fencing is down. But I can see that this little unit is just that --little! I'm going to save your answer and ponder over the numbers a bit. Really, I'm a fairly intelligent person but for some reason when amps and volts and other electrolingo is thrown at me, I get all ferhoodled.

[LaMar]

Yes you can use the solar panel and battery to run a few small DC lights and DC gadgets directly or you could hook the battery to an inverter to change it to AC voltage for running 110 volt AC gadgets.

A basic solar electric system has 4 components:

solar pannels, power controller, storage batteries, and an inverter.

I have some videos on a small off-grid system that will explain how each component works that might help you:

http://www.youtube.com/solarcabin

LaMar

[patience]

woodchuck acres,

You remember beginning Algebra? Here are the basics of electrical stuff.

Volts X Amps = Watts

Amps X Hours = Amp hours

Watts X Hours = Watt hours

And, 1,000 watt hours = One Kilowatt hour

Hope this helps get rid of some of the mysteries about electricity. Just write 'em down somewhere. :)

[woodchuck acres]

woodchuck acres,

You remember beginning Algebra? Here are the basics of electrical stuff.

Volts X Amps = Watts

Amps X Hours = Amp hours

Watts X Hours = Watt hours

And, 1,000 watt hours = One Kilowatt hour

Hope this helps get rid of some of the mysteries about electricity. Just write 'em down somewhere. :)

Thanks, Patience. I can do the math, it's putting it all together that makes my head spin.

It's like me and motors--I even took a class years ago in car repair but it still remains a mystery. Now plants, that's different--we speak the same language.

But please don't blame it on my xx chromosomes (my husband is almost as bad as I am, in fact I was the one who got the snowblower going the other day).

But I will write down your info!