For now it is not completed yet,but I am working on it, also see my first website : www.doctersnuggles.come2me.nl (allmost the same name...)
This website describes how I build my solar panels.
The cells I use are from the Solland Solar factory in the south of the Netherlands ( Heerlen). These are old cells, meaning they have been lying on the shelf in the factory for some years ( don't know how long...) . I got them for a nice price because they have a very low efficiency : only 9% . For the standards of today that is very low ! But the price therefore ( price per WattPeak) was very low. And that is why it is possible for me to build solar panels for a very low price.These cells measure 156 x 156 mm ( 6 x 6 inch )
Below 5 panels , not connected but just put outside in the sun to do some measurements and to make pictures. The panels give about 50 to 55 Wp each. There are 24 cells in each panel.
At the moment I am finishing panel nr.8 and when that one is finished I am going to attach them to my house.
Below the cells in the packing box. To handle them I use latex gloves to protect them from any (body)grease.
First thing is to cut the celwires to the correct lenght.
Below you can see that I bent the wire in the middle to give it some slack for temperature expansion/contractions. The inside of a panel can go over 60 Celsius/140 Fahrenheit
The solder and the flux that I use:
I don't need much solder , less than 2 grams per panel of 24 cells. The packaging on the picture is 17 grams.
The fluxpen is very nice to work with. The one below is still my first one and I have done 8 panels with it. But before these Solland-panels I allready have used it on other panels.
Before soldering the celwire I first put flux on it
Then I lay the celwire over the cell , and solder it. Remark : I don't use any extra solder.Just the solder that is allready on the wire is enough. The only thing needed is to have the tip of your soldering station to have some clean fresh solder. You need this as it will form a "bridge" for the heat to flow to the cell .
It is pretty important to have the right tip for soldering.Also the solderingstation needs to have enough power. The one that I use is 150 Watt. They also use this one in the solarpanel-factories in China.
Picture of my solderingstation
2 wires soldered on the frontside of the cell.
Below a bunch of wires which are folded at the end. Also they are shorter. You use them at the end of a string of cells.The fold is very handy to have for keeping the buswire (that connects the strings of cells that lie next to eachother in a panel) in place before soldering. Pictures further down below will clearly show that.
Here you see how I solder one of these wires on the backside of a cell. This cell will be at the end of a string.It allready has the wires on the frontside.
Once you have prepared enough cells to make a string you can start to solder them to eachother. Below you see how I do this to get them in a nice row of cells
The cell below is one with the short folded wires on the frontside of the cell.
Apply flux on the cell (it doesnt really matter much if you apply the flux on the wire or on the cell) It can be that for soldering the wires on the frontside of the cell, it will give a cleaner solderingconnection (which is more important for the frontside of the cell) when applying the flux on the wire instead of on the cell. But you can try that for yourself.
Pictures below speak for themselves......
See that I use nails to keap the cells in place. After soldering you just pull them out .The holes are slightly wider than the nails.
I have found out that when soldering the backside too fast, the cells made a sort off cracking sounds.Probably from the fast heating /expanding followed by quick coolingdown/shrinking.When taking it real slow moving the solderingtip over the wire it gave no more of these cracking sounds. I did not run into these cracking sounds when soldering the wires to the frontside.And I dont really know why. But this slow soldering on the back does not give these cracking sounds .And that is the most important thing !
Below you can see 3 strings, 2 allready in place and nr 3 still upside down. See the glass plate that I glue the cells on. I have drawn lines on a big piece of paper. The glass plate is laid over this piece of paper. You can see the lines through the glas. And these lines indicate were to put the cells on the glass plate.
You can see that most of the nails are removed. Now I have to put the cells frontside facing up. It is difficult to explain how I turn them around because my english is not good enough,but hopefully the pictures show what I do. I just let the string fall , and because it is very lightweight it will fall lightly, so the cells will not break.
Next step is to move the cells partly over the edge so I can put a piece/stick of wood under the string
This way I can lift it up with two hands.
Now I put a small dot of glue on the glass to glue the cells on the glas.Just one little dot aiming for the middle of each of the middle 4 cells. In the pictures further dow below you can see why I do not glue the cells at each end of the string.
And here you see how I place the string over the dots of glue. I remove the piece of wood without the wood getting in contact with these dots of glue. I do this by "rolling" the stick of wood "backwards" along the backside of the string.
After this I press each cell a bit downward to the glas to flatten out the dot of glue. And you see I put weights on the cells and I leave them on long enough for the glue to dry.
Next step is to make sure that the folds are not too flat. I bend them open a little....... This is the preparation for connecting the strings to eachother with "buswire"
Below a picture of the piece of some layers of plywood that I made. I use it as you can see to lift the 4 cells while they are connected each in its string.
I have prepared some of the buswires. You can see they are "T"-shaped. The vertical part of the "T" will become the "plus" or the "minus". The biggest "T" will be in the middle; I will need that one for connecting "bypass-diodes" later.
The fold ,as you can see, keeps the busbar nicely in place.
Press it close so soldering can be done...... The needle is to keep the busbar better in place.
I forgot to make pictures of the next step were I put the front plate of glass in place.......but I will make them in future.
Picture below shows the frontplate in place
Below a closeup : As you can see , the sealant is pressed out between the glass. I will cut it away.What you also can see is the strip of foam inside the glass.It is there to form a barrier between the sealant and the cells for when you put the sealant on the glas before putting the front glassplate on.Only problem is that the foam I used is not UV-resistant, so I will have have to cover it later, probably by putting paint on the outside of the glass to protect the foam from direct sunlight. If I do not do this ,on the long term it will probably pulverise.....
I will have to think of something better for this....
Pictures above and below are from 2 different panels on the one below I covered the strip of foam with a strip of paper before placing the frontplate of glas to protect it from the (direct) sunlight.
Picture below : I have cut away the sealant that was pressed outwards.
You can see 2 things here :
1 : the top plate of tempered glas has the edges grinded (this is done allready in the glass factory before the tempering-proces of the glas took place)
2 : I have made the backplate slightly smaller than the frontplate.
Above and below the plus,minus and /or middle contact.See the heatshrink-tubing that I have put on it before the top-glasplate and the sealant was put on. Notice also that because the backplate of glas is slightly smaller than the frontplate, this plus/minus/middle wire can more easy be folded to the back of the aft plate without being in the way later of the frame.Also it is easier for applying the second layer of sealant shown further down below.
Next step below is filling up another "barrier" of sealant. As the first sealant inbetween the glas is silicon-based (Dow Corning pv 804) , this second layer is a polymer sealant ( Zettex ).
I have been told that nothing really sticks on silicon-sealant. So thats why I clean the sides first before applying the polymer-sealant. So it can adhere to the glass.( Another advantage of keeping the frontplate bigger than the backplate as it will give a better free surface of glass for the sealant to adhere to )
Above : A piece of wood keeping the wire in place while the sealant is drying.
The next step is about the bypass-diodes. A nice explanation is given on the following link : http://pvcdrom.pveducation.org/MODULE/Bypass.htm
( from the website of Hante, thank him for that :http://www.xs4all.nl/~hante/index-nl.html )
The diode will have to be able to deal with a minimum of 6 Amps ( for the big cells that I use ). The diodes shown are designed for max 10 Amps and 175 Celsius.
Above a schematic of how to connect the bypass-diodes.For connecting them, besides the plus and the minus, I also use the middle contact/wire coming out from between the glassplates.
Ik giet de diodes in een blok polyester. Hierboven en onder de mal daarvoor met de diodes "in place".
Nu een glasplaatje ervoor geklemd , goed ingesmeerd met vet (net zoals de rest van de mal) zodat straks de uitgeharde polyester gemakkelijk loskomt.
Na de polyester en de harder te hebben gemengd giet ik het mbv een papieren trechtertje in de mal.
En zo ziet het er uit als dat uitgehard is.
Nu de zijde waarmee het tegen de achterplaat gelijmd wordt goed ontvetten en mooi vlak schuren.
En vervolgens vast lijmen met de polymeerkit ( of welke geschikte lijm dan ook). En aandrukken met een steen er op.
Vervolgens 3 van de draden aan de 3 wires van het panelen vastsolderen. Daarbij schuif ik eerst per draad 2 stukjes krimpkous over de draad die dan later over het gesoldeerde gedeelte geschoven kunnen worden en vervolgens met de fohn verwarmd om te laten krimpen.
Met dit koperen (geisoleerde) wikkeldraadje houd ik de te solderen delen bij elkaar. Het zal niet mee "vast"solderen en kan dus naderhand zo losgehaald worden.
Hieronder het 2e stukje krimpkous.
De resterende 2 draden die uit het blokje komen zijn de "plus"en de "min" .
Hieronder : met wat dotjes sealant zorg ik dat de draden netjes tegen de achterplaat zitten.
