I am sharing my progress on my 100% solar powered Wyze Cam Pan. I have decided to power Wyze Cam Pan via solar power as the nearest outlet is around 600ft away from the gate where it’ll be placed. I will be installing it this Mother’s Day weekend, so far progress is good. I did a lot of research before purchasing the equipment.
05/10/2019:
All equipment arrived (all purchased from Amazon).
Setup & tested all equipment.
05/18/2019:
Installed system.
The camera will not be connected to the internet, only when the phone I use passes by with the hotspot online.
I tested the solar panel, connected and setup all wiring, triple checked the Wyze Cam Pan, works perfectly. I will be installing it at our property’s gate entrance in order to record 24/7, with a 256 GB Micro SD card (hoping it works, I have seen others say it does), offline, and everyday once I pass by, my hotspot will connect so I can review the footage.
Please keep us updated on progress. In particular, how the V2 camera copes with lack of network connectivity. I’ve found that mine does funky things about 1.5 hours after the hotspot goes away. Sometimes goes clickity-click-click, as if it’s rebooting. Sometimes stops recording.
This was a bug and it has been fixed with the latest V2 firmware update, the Wyze Cam Pan has gotten this fix two updates ago. Be sure to update your cameras.
Is your Wifi too far away to connect, but you do have Wifi somewhere on same property?
If so you could use a repeater to get WiFi to camera, a 900 MHz web radio can link up to a mile and a half then have a WAP plug into web radio for WiFi at gate running on same solar power supply.
I use a Microhard IP921B pair to get my internet from my home to a barn just under a mile away, it is not as fast as the home internet (10-12Mbps avg.) while in the barn but good enough. The IP921B can pass up to 1.1Mbps and I get close to 1 Mb/s which is good enough for my needs while there.
WiFi will not be necessary however it can be powered via Ubiquiti access points. I am using my phone hotspot to set it up, I will be able to access footage whenever I am at the gate.
I thought of that, but since the camera will be mounted upside down it shouldn’t be an issue. The footage will be seen via the hotspot on the Wyze app with the playback function.
When I use the playback function it’s a second by second real time process. When I record events only (like cars going by) I often end up with nothing moving in the scene because it’s gone by already.
I’ve one camera (out of 6) that the microSD card is a pain to get seated.
Curious as to why you chose to stump this cost against say, a Reolink Argus 2 or Eco with solar panel at more than half the cost, for your particular use case?
Really nice setup! I appreciate your photos and source links
[edited:]
I have never done a setup like this before, but have always wanted to for this and other projects. I have a question about the solar panel: If my camera only needs 5 volts (it 's the smaller Wyze cam), do I need the 50W panel or could I go with a smaller one like 10W panel that puts out 12 volts?
The specs on the camera say it has a 10 W power supply (2000 ma @5 V).
Your solar cell rating is optimistic for a new panel at optimum conditions — ie full sun-- 90 degree angle facing the sun— cool panel — . So your 10W panel would be sufficient at summer noon for a few minutes (ignoring the panel temperature issue).
I am curious as what will be used to get from the battery to the 5V required for the camera.
Cool project. I am not sure I would have done it this way personally due to the app not being that user friendly for reviewing footage. I would have probably used a wired camera with PoE or just setup a trail cam and swapped SD Cards.
My experience is a 50w Solar Panel is needed for locations where you don’t always have direct sunlight and/or in extremely cold environments (eg Minnesota). Anything less will experience blackout periods.
