15 Aug How We Mounted Our Solar Panels On Our Sailboat

You may have watched our latest YouTube videos, where we dove deep into our solar panel. https://youtu.be/bqlGqlyJ4cA

Here we want to share the way we have the current panels mounted as well as at the end, reveal what mistakes we think we have made and what we would do instead. For now though, we want to talk about how we mounted both the old and new panels on our bimini. We have learned a lot over the last 3 years about off the grid solar setups and how to mount them on a boat, and we want to share that knowledge with you.

About Our Flexible Solar Panels Which Failed

We had 3 Renogy 100 watt Flexible Solar Panels that failed us after 3 years of excellent service. (Note: We are really happy with our Renogy flexible panels overall. Renogy did honor their 5 Year Warranty and sent replacement panels for us to an address in the USA, but they could not ship them directly to Brazil.) More on how we tested them and determined they were failed in the video here: https://youtu.be/bqlGqlyJ4cA

Their power output was excellent, and they were super light weight. We actually replaced a single Renogy 160 watt (now a 175 watt) flexible panel (which also failed but was not eligible for the warranty because we drilled holes to mount it) with these 100 watt panels while in St. Thomas, USVI.

 

Our flexible panels failed us what seemed to be intermittently right around the equator, where we should have been putting out the most power possible. We aren’t quite sure why they failed, but we think it as due to internal corrosion inside the laminate of the panels themselves. The panels tested as functional, but when connected to a charge controller would output extremely low or no power.

How We Mounted Our Flexible Panels on Our Bimini

Our flexible panels were mounted to our bimini and dodger in two separate ways, via sewing attachments and via rails and rail mounts.

Our Renogy 50 watt flexible solar panels are all sewn on. The sewing attachments were sewn into our existing bimini and dodger by sailmakers in Middletown, RI and in Grenada. They use Velcro on the panel, and Velcro sewn into flaps on the dodger and bimini. Also sewn on are small tubes closed by Velcro to hold and organize the wires.

 

Pros: super light, basically hidden from view, looks like they should be there

Cons: stitching and velcro adhesive wears over time, can cause dodger or bimni top to sag a bit, sometimes catch rain water

Our 100 watt flexible panels were all mounted with tube clamps and aluminum c-channel bar stock. We used some House Tuning 1″ Off Road Light Clamps to secure the panels, along with bolts and zip ties.

 

This proved extremely lightweight (probably the lightest possible solar setup mounted on the stern of any sailboat we know). The setup worked great for over two years, and gives the flexible panels unlimited airspace underneath for cooling. They were never stuck on a hot deck in the sun. Even though the panels were mounted this way, and looked less substantial, they held up to some thunderstorms with 60 knot winds at anchor and birds landing on them.

Pros: Cooling airspace underneath, super lightweight, cheap (er…cost effective)

Cons: Looks DIY, not as solid

How We Mounted Our New 155 Watt Solar Panels On Our Bimini

Our new 155 watt solar panels are mounted in a similar way, but we used actual solar panel rail to mount them to. The solar panel rail is then mounted to the 1 inch bimini stainless tubing with the off road light clamps. This is a really strong setup and we are really happy with it so far. It looks and feels much more substantial than our 100 watt flexible panels, but we haven’t been in an area like the Caribbean in summer yet we we are able to see the full output. Note, we only went with 155 watt panels at 19% efficiency because that was the best we could reasonably get at the time while in a remote anchorage in Brazil. We would likely use 22% efficient 200 watt panels if we were in the USA doing this project.

 

 

What Would We Do Differently?

If we could do it all over again we would create a completely custom solution for our boat, not just tag onto the existing dodger and bimini.

We would create a hard dodger with either laminated in panels or glued on flexible panels. Custom embedded laminated panels would be best as we could maximize the space available in this area and control the voltage to match in parallel with our system for less loss in shading.

For the bimini, we would likely remove it, as well as the wind generator and radar poles. We would create a custom (but still removable) arch to hold all of these items but maximize our solar real estate without more aerodynamic resistance. We would also be able to integrate our dinghy davits into this arch and it would be much more substantial so it would not flex in big seas and be safer. We would still want it mounted in a way, with waterproof connectors, that we could remove the whole thing for racing and place it on the dock. Our preferred material would likely be aluminum, similar to a wakeboard tower.

We think we could put almost 1000 watts comfortably in this area and another 200 on the dodger, bringing our total output up to 1200 watts from our existing 865 watts. That is a pipe dream (get the pun, you use pipes and tubes to make the arch) for now though, but if we were you and starting over from scratch 3 years ago, we would have done this before we started and have had a worry free super powerful solar system from the get go, instead of trying to save money and weight.