Philip Heaton Posts: 36 11 days ago	Philip Heaton Posts: 36 I have 5 framed panels totalling 330watts. Two are twenty years old and three are 15 years old. I had a new Victron Smart Solar MPPT installed this year, but I am wondering if it might be time to replace these 15 and 20 yewars old panels. Any thoughts?
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Simon Currin Administrator Posts: 828 10 days ago	Simon Currin Administrator Posts: 828 Are you noticing that your solar generation is significantly reduced over the years? Difficult to assess as you have shifted location many times in 20 years! We put 750watt of new solar on Shimshal in January 2024 and have been shocked to find that we now have several dead panels (no volts) and our peak generating power is just 200watts at mid day. Our panels are flexible Sun Power Panels and I understand that they don’t last as long as rigid but 18 months does seem pretty hopeless. Your 20 years seems incredible by comparison! In fairness I think Shimshal suffered some kind of minor lightning event while on the hard in French Polynesia as many electrical items were either damaged or fused despite all being disconnected. That may have taken out some of our panels. As an aside, the rigid solar we have on our house have shown negligible decline in output over the 15 years they have installed. Simon -- Simon Currin S/V Shimshal simon@medex.org.uk
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Simon Currin Administrator Posts: 828 10 days ago	Simon Currin Administrator Posts: 828 Are you noticing that your solar generation is significantly reduced over the years? Difficult to assess as you have shifted location many times in 20 years! We put 750watt of new solar on Shimshal in January 2024 and have been shocked to find that we now have several dead panels (no volts) and our peak generating power is just 200watts at mid day. Our panels are flexible Sun Power Panels and I understand that they don’t last as long as rigid but 18 months does seem pretty hopeless. Your 20 years seems incredible by comparison! In fairness I think Shimshal suffered some kind of minor lightning event while on the hard in French Polynesia as many electrical items were either damaged or fused despite all being disconnected. That may have taken out some of our panels. As an aside, the rigid solar we have on our house have shown negligible decline in output over the 15 years they have installed. Simon -- Simon Currin S/V Shimshal simon@medex.org.uk
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neilm Posts: 29 5 days ago	neilm Posts: 29 We installed a 150Watt, supposedly top quality, panel in Scotland in 2015. It worked OK In 2022 we replaced it with a relatively cheap 500 Watt panel. We find that in bright sun, the output is pretty much what I expected, 500/175 (=2.8 times as much) However I think the more modern panel does much better in cloudy weather than the old one The 500 Watt panel gives us about 130 Ah in a 12 volt system, very close to the equator in June, and about 120 Ah in British Columbia in August Of course that will drop when winter, short days and cloudy weather arrives. Both panels are rigid I would be inclined to replace you old panels
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