LED powering Solar panels

majins

majins

Well-Known Member
We all get crazy idea after a smoke but here is one I had and one iv done some testing with.

Can you use solar panels under LED lights?
The thought being to recapture some power thats getting wasted on the floor and roof.

Here are the results I found.
Took a old solar panel from a small usb solar phone charger, That advertises 4W charging capacity.

Direct sun light 4.8V
Shaded sun light 3V
In doors 1V
Red LED direct 2V (3inch)
Blue LED direct 2V (3inch)
3070 COB direct 4.6V (1 foot away)
3070 COB indirect 4.2V (Held above LEDs so light has to bounce off floor to get to it)

Voltage doesn't really tell the full story tho so next I went onto checking the current.
Direct sun light 0.8amp
Shaded sun light 0.2amp
In doors 0amp
Red LED direct 0 amp
Blue LED direct 0 amp
3070 COB direct 0.2amp
3070 COB indirect 0amp

So to my original question it works. But its very un-efficent.
Did some number crunching and if I was to line my whole grow room id get about 2.3% power recovery. But then that power would of been better spent as light bouncing around the plants.

Just to put that into perspective wired up a PC fan to the led and tested it again a 30W from the wall driven 3070 COB.

It only has enough current from 6inch or closer to spin the fan.
 
iHearAll

iHearAll

Well-Known Member
yea i tried this in the lab. it works somewhat
i used 2 x 50w panels which normally put out 12v but they only pushed 6 and some change when faced directly i think youve found that also. but for sake of energy efficiency why not line a tight grow box with panels??!? probably cost effectiveness. i saw someone who had take a quad copter and mounted a single solar cell to it and powered it (directly i believe, no battery) by emission of a 5w laser.
 
Kul

Kul

Active Member
majins said:
We all get crazy idea after a smoke but here is one I had and one iv done some testing with.

Can you use solar panels under LED lights?
The thought being to recapture some power thats getting wasted on the floor and roof.

Here are the results I found.
Took a old solar panel from a small usb solar phone charger, That advertises 4W charging capacity.

Direct sun light 4.8V
Shaded sun light 3V
In doors 1V
Red LED direct 2V (3inch)
Blue LED direct 2V (3inch)
3070 COB direct 4.6V (1 foot away)
3070 COB indirect 4.2V (Held above LEDs so light has to bounce off floor to get to it)

Voltage doesn't really tell the full story tho so next I went onto checking the current.
Direct sun light 0.8amp
Shaded sun light 0.2amp
In doors 0amp
Red LED direct 0 amp
Blue LED direct 0 amp
3070 COB direct 0.2amp
3070 COB indirect 0amp

So to my original question it works. But its very un-efficent.
Did some number crunching and if I was to line my whole grow room id get about 2.3% power recovery. But then that power would of been better spent as light bouncing around the plants.

Just to put that into perspective wired up a PC fan to the led and tested it again a 30W from the wall driven 3070 COB.

It only has enough current from 6inch or closer to spin the fan.
Click to expand...
Science bitches!! Nice work op. Thought about doing the same but was to lazy to test lmao
 
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