caravans sit outside year after year, often in winter they are covered in snow, I think if you gathered the snow off a 24ft by 7ft by 6 inches deep off the roof it would weigh a lot more than 8 kgs!
I would be more concerned finding something that you could use to attach it to the roof that could cope with the forces of wind speed when driving and also didn't cause a possible damp issue
As well is two words!
How does a sage know everything about everything? or does he? or does he just think he does?
Remember, if you buy something you bought it, not brought it.
It's far from ideal having the panel on the roof as they're less efficient, however mainly for the 'fit and fotget' convenience, I opted to fit a 100w panel to the roof of my former Bailey and it worked suprisingly well.
We are often 'off the grid' for a week or so and not experienced any issues.
As for fitting, I used a set of corner feet that raised the panel approx 40mm clear of the roof. The feet were fixed to the roof with one of the Sikaflex adhesive products (can't recall which one at the moment), and I passed the cable into the van via a weatherproofed grommet (also stuck down) so only a single hole for the cable that dropped straight into the corner of the wardrobe. Cable then into void beneath wardrobe (luckily behind the battery box), to controller then battery.
I didn't have any concern regarding the weight, or as to whether the feet would move (which I periodically checked), and in fact I'm about to fit an additional panel to my current van, to supplement the existing factory fitted unit.
In all reality, the convenience works for me but to be fair, you can't really remove it when you change the van.
"A portable briefcase type seems a bit of a faff on and how do you stop it from getting nicked when you leave all day ! "
we have that type and no faff at all, hubby puts ours on the roof and held in place with suctions cups, and placed at the right angle towards the sun then
Quote: Originally posted by geoff+emmy on 13/3/2015
What about the semi-flexible type? a 100 watt one weighs 2.8 kls
The semi flexible type addresses the weight issue but on an unbonded aluminium roof as the OP has it will be flexing about all the time from thermal expansion of the sheet.
I suspect the semi flexible units are not going to be that tolerant to this constant movement; I think they are more designed to accommodate a bend in intital instalation.
"we have that type and no faff at all, hubby puts ours on the roof and held in place with suctions cups"
Thats got me thinking I like the idea of the suckers, I had an idea of using a semi flexible panel and mounting it with velcro when arriving on site.
Vans in storage so planning to go down tomorrow and see how practical it is to place one on the roof, just don't fancy the idea of leaving a panel chained or wired to the van at ground level while we are out all day !
the problem using Velcro is that every time you position the caravan on a site it will be in a different postion to face the sun, that is why we use suckers as they don't leave anything on the roof then
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Topic: Fixed Solar Panel
