Maintain battery with Solar Charging

[Kilo Bravo]

Moved the toon from being parked at the house to a outdoor storage lot near a ramp,
next season will be in a covered slip with a lift, neither location has AC power
available for the trickle charger.
Looking for a solution for now and the next location also.

The solar panel linked to and pictured looks like a good way to go for my needs.
Instead of this regulator, would like one with an LED read out and preferably waterproof.
And here is the kicker, charge two batteries that are not similar, any idea's suggestions for this set up?

Does anyone have a set up already that is supplying your charging needs?
Care to share?

http://www.harborfreight.com/15-watt-12 ... 20provided

[MH Hawker]

you can in fact use a solar panel to maintain a battery, how ever its takes awhile to top one off. i am using that exact one my self. A night fishing trip will often run my battery down from 10 to 15 % and i also dont have shore power at my slip and to make it even worse I am running a little 15 hp motor that only has a 4 amp charging system.

So in my case its a solar panel or carry battery's. I chose the solar panel route and this is my second year using one and so far it works just fine. I will take 3 to 5 days to bring mine up to full after a night of fishing. But after all its just sitting on the slip so you know any thing helps.

The HF 15 watt panel is about as small as you want to go it puts out around 1.25 amps in full light, the 5 watt one are about useless, the 15 watt one over a period of days will do the trick. I dont use the regulator, I started out trying it and found it pointless. About ever 6 to 8 weeks or so I add about 1/2 inch of water to the cells.
Over this last winter I thought I should be good and the panel would keep me at full charge but the regulator failed and the battery went flat and this year i wired it in straight.

Hope that helps.

[kiowacampers]

We have a 135watt Kyocera 12v and a Morningstar sunsavor duo 25amp dual battery charger with meter. Kind of expensive but we run 4 batteries along with a charger and motor plus a genny. We have a houseboat type so we are able to put the solar panel on the roof since it is quite big. Our Guest 20amp charger just bit the dust so we ordered a Guest 30 amp charger which will be here on Friday. My husband is beginning to believe it is a money pit! As everyone says, the definition of boat is "Bring on another thousand" Boy is that the truth... I love our boat.... I think we have over 100k invested in our little pontoon if you count the nice building we had to put up to store it... Did I mention, I love our boat...

[babock]

Since a 15W panel is usually rated at 17V, the current output is going to be less than an amp.

[rancherlee]

I have a 5w panel and it keeps my all 3 of my batteries maintained, won't really charge them but they show 12.9-13v with the sun shining. You can use up to a 15w panel without the charge regulator

[Kilo Bravo]

From what I understood, the regulator was to keep
The battery from discharging as much as they are to
Prevent over charging.