I am going to be adding a roof to our porch, and would like to put a solar panel on the roof so I can charge my escooter. However I am unsure where exactly to start.

I believe I need the panels and an inverter to switch it from dc to ac.

This is the charger it uses:

  • perestroika@slrpnk.net
    5·
    10 hours ago

    To manage without an inverter and charge your bike almost directly from solar (soldering and electronics skills needed) I would consider an adjustable DC/DC converter.

    1. Small step-down converter with current limit:
    Input voltage range: 6-40.00V
Output voltage range: 0V-32.00V
Output current: 0-5.1A
Output power range: 0-160W

    https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005006294300036.html

    1. Big step-down converter with current limit:
    Input voltage: DC12-80V (can not be used for 72V battery)
Output voltage: 2.5V-50V adjustable (only buck) (maximum output voltage = input voltage * 0.8)
Output current: 20A (MAX) 25A overcurrent
Maximum power: 600W
Conversion efficiency: ≥ 93%

    https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005007391865816.html

    1. With serious and silent cooling, dual displays (voltage and current), adaptive current limiting that considers temperature, input up to 120 V DC (be careful, this voltage level is deadly):
    Input: DC 25-120V
Output: DC 1.2-75V adjustable
Current: 20A (MAX)
Power: 600W (Reduce current based on heat dissipation when voltage difference is high)

    https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005010659062631.html

    The downside of a simple converter is that it doesn’t know about the optimal loading point of your solar panel (doesn’t do MPPT or maximum power point tracking). If you want that (it gives 30% more productivity), consider an entry level solar charge controller, but it must support 48V battery mode (I notice that your charger outputs 63V, the termination voltage of a 48V battery is usually 64V) and manual fine adjustment of the termination voltage (to bring it lower).

    This might work since it appears to have a “user” (user defined) battery type:

    https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005010080097662.html

    Manual here to find out if it actually would:

    https://www.nikom.biz/pic_info/A656017/Homysun-MPPT-Solar-Charge-Controller-datasheet-60A.pdf

    Note: dial in less than your full battery voltage and don’t push the Chinese products to their maximum advertised current. Your upmost output voltage + voltage ripple + measurement error must stay below the full battery voltage. Of course, you must have a balancer and BMS (to stop everything in an emergency) on your battery. I also recommend a timer.

    If you need to step the panel voltage upwards, consider a “boost converter” or “step up converter” instead, or wire two panels in series and use a step down converter.

  • Iconoclast@feddit.uk
    4·
    16 hours ago

    While definitely not the cheapest and probably not hugely efficient either, just getting one of those Ecoflow, Jackery, Bluetti style power banks and hooking it up to a solar panel would likely be the easiest solution and comes with the benefit of being able to easily be moved elsewhere and the powerbank itself is a good off-grid power source to replace a generator.

  • poVoq@slrpnk.netM
    3·
    17 hours ago

    63V DC output 🤔

    Not hundert percent sure, but you are probably dealing with a nominally 48V battery pack.

    Instead of converting back and forth DC/AC/DC, I would look for a solar charge controller that can charge 48V Li-ion battery packs.

    The only problem might be finding a suitable plug if you don’t want to cut it off your existing charger.

    • nocturne@slrpnk.netOP
      1·
      17 hours ago

      A replacement charger is $100, and not often available without a scooter, so cutting off the plug is not optimal… but not out of the question. However I am looking at getting a second scooter for the family which will likely have a different charger. I cannot wait until charger plugs are standardized.

      The new charger has these specs:

      • blarghly@lemmy.worldEnglish
        2·
        16 hours ago

        Yeah, I would rec refining your vision - you aren’t building a solar charger for your bike, but building a solar system which can charge anything.

        I won’t say I’m an expert in these systems, but my recollection from building out my van about a decade ago was that you want solar panels, a charge controller, a battery bank (maybe), something for your load to plug into, and an inverter or adapter for your bike.

        Electricity comes from the solar panels, but it varies in volatage or amperage (i forget) as the sun varies in intensity. A charge controller smooths this out, and will output the appropriate constant voltage at an amperage determined by your load. The battery is there to accumulate power when you arent running anything on the system - after all, the sun shines during the day, which is probably also when you want to ride your bike. Also, I remember something about it is dangerous to not have a battery on some charge controllers, since the electricity needs somewhere to go even if you have no load - but maybe thats bullshit. So the CC and BAT work together to provide power for you to use for whatever load you want, but it is DC power. From here, you have to choose between the more expensive and dumb path, or the more adventurous and dumb path.

        The expensive and dumb path is to get an inverter to convert your power to AC. This will let you plug your bike in like a normal wall outlet. Done. But inverters cost an annoying amount of money, and you are also wasting a good chunk of your generated electricity converting from DC to AC, which would be fine if you actually needed AC - but then you are losing even more power converting back from AC to DC. Ridikidonk! But this has the added benefit that you can also just plug, like, your laptop charger in if you just want a normal outlet to use.

        The adventurous and dumb option is to modify your charger and/or make your own charger to convert from (probably) 12v DC to whatever voltage your bike needs. Iirc, amperage listed on the charger doesn’t denote how much current you need to provide - your power source will provide as much amperage as it can until it runs out of power - but denotes the maximum amperage the device will take. Presumably, this should be as simple as getting some little electronic componenet to step up your voltage to an appropriate level, and then getting that electricity into your bike charging port… but if the charging port on your bike is proprietary, like the other user said, the easiest solition is chopping off the end of the cable and using that. A slightly more difficult but still easy enough (maybe?) option would be to splice in an alrernate charging port on the bike itself that you could use when at home, keeping OG cable as-is for charging on the go. Or maybe the cable connector isnt proprietary, just obscure, and you can find a supplier on alibaba.

        So you have solar, charge controller, battery, and inverter or load. Between all these are wires. The wires need to be the correct guage to handle the anticipated amperage, or they will catch on fire. Then you need to put fuses in all the wires in case they end up with too much amperage anyway, so they don’t catch on fire. And then just in case they catch on fire just because, or someone starts getting electricuted by your poorly planned system, you’ll want some clearly labelled and accessible cutoff switches between solar/CC, CC/BAT, and CC/load.

        As you can see, this is, in fact a whole thing. And I do wonder if everything I just wrote was a mistake, and you may be better off just building a dedicated bike-charging system using more basic electrical components… but hopefully you have a better idea of the problem space. I expect your challenges will be:

        1. Taming the wiley solar output.
        2. Ensuring sufficient power for the bike’s needs even in non-ideal solar conditions.
        3. That friggin charger connector.
      • poVoq@slrpnk.netM
        2·
        16 hours ago

        Hmm, odd that this one has 84V output. That’s AFAIK beyond the typical 48V battery charging voltage.

        The problem with converting back and forth is both efficiency and that you need a seperate buffer battery (or at least super-capacitor).

        IMHO, maybe the best idea is to just buy a so called balcony solar kit to feed into your regular home power circut and then charge as usual from a regular outlet.

  • bitofarambler@crazypeople.onlineEnglish
    2·
    16 hours ago

    Hey there, I took an ebike around with me while RVing through the states and charged everything with a DIY solar setup.

    Panels - charge controller - deep-cycle battery - inverter - power strip(additional outlets), and I had all the free electricity I needed, although I always wanted to add a little wind turbine to the mix.

    Size how much power your panels produce, make sure the capacity of the charge controller is higher than that. Then size how much peak power you will be converting into AC through the inverter and make sure the capacity of your inverter is higher than that.

    Connect the panels to the charge controller, connect the charge controller to the battery, connect the inverter to the battery and then connect the power strip to the inverter if you need additional outlets.

    I suggest used panels from a surplus store, they’re much cheaper, often high-quality since they’re industrial-use removed/replaced by newer panels and still have 90+% efficiency after years.

    I went to SanTan solar coincidentally, in Arizona, and their panels are even cheaper today then when I got mine, 250w for $40.