Solar Panel First Look

[R.Good]

The Solar Panel arrived today!!!

Due to the inclement weather in my area I won’t be able to provide much of an overview other than some pics.

First, no sticker, no app badge

But the important stuff… The device feels solid, like it will be able to withstand the weather in the Midwest for a good long time, as well as the other bits.

I will say that with mounting hardware I personally don’t use the screws or anchors that come with most things and prefer to use the brands I keep at home. But what is provided is sufficient.

What is in the box

I did set this up in the house, One are of note
you will have to pull the silicon cover off of the camera to properly affix the adapter cable to the camera. The seal feels pretty tight to ensure no moisture gets in. I do plan to mount this over the camera as a cover. It will protect and give power.

On the area of note: Make sure there isn’t any left over pieces from pulling the tab out or the adaptor may not seal properly.

All connected, not much to it really… installation will be the fun part.

Once connected open the camera, go to settings, accessories, wyze solar panel, tell the app you already have one and don’t need to shop and toggle the switch to powered by solar panel.

Once I am able to deploy I will provide more detail, but the ice and snow storm are keeping me indoors for now.

[spamoni]

Excellent information. Thanks for providing, now I can’t wait for mine to come in.

[carverofchoice]

I wish I didn’t have to pull off the original silicon cover…I want to usually keep it connected to the solar panel, but I do sometimes like to take my WCO other places for special uses to and in those cases I would like to still have that cover. This appears to suggest I may need to simply get a second WCO for all those other uses instead

Perhaps a future WCO design should take this into account, and make a way they can both exist simultaneously. On the other hand, I’m sure that’s a very small niche request. Most people who use the solar would never move it.

It looks great. I hope mine comes soon!

[R.Good]

It is mentioned in the Quick Setup Guide as a TIP to save.

[Newshound]

Nice!

@R.Good

Make sure there isn’t any left over pieces from pulling the tab out or the adaptor may not seal properly.

A trick on that – use a razor blade or wire cutters on only 1 side of the 2 sides that go into the camera. Then the side you didn’t cut will pull all of the rubber out of the chassis. Then cut that part off like the other side. You won’t need the ‘between’ rubber again.

Don’t overtighten things like the ring. It may cause you to apply more force later than is recommended for the housing.

Also, if you have 2 cameras together like I do, you can charge both of them by swapping the blank plug cover you removed and the panel’s sealed charging cable between the two every month or two.

[carverofchoice]

Good tips.

I wonder how hard it would be to modify it with a splitter. Granted, Wyze doesn’t sell the connector end separately anyway, but if they did, I wonder how successfully it could charge 2 WCO’s with the same pannel. I am sure it depends A LOT on how much traffic there is.

Though for $20 including the cord, I guess it’d be simpler to just buy a second one. But it would still be interesting.

[Newshound]

Interesting idea. In my own tests a WOC will take 1.45A if it can find it. The Solar Panel supplies 0.5A, but you take what you can get when charging, if the charging device can keep the voltage up. Weirdly enough, this one seems to.

The biggest problem may be finding another pigtail that seals the WOC connector. The price of the solar panel was worth it just to get that pigtail, lol. You can also use an outdoor power adapter with that!

So a splitter might only let you trickle charge, but that might be plenty when you only have to recharge every couple of months, and the panel can recharge a WOC from 50% in a couple of sunny days.

[carverofchoice]

That is actually great. So I assume it’s 1.45A while it’s actually actively recording, and it must be significantly lower when it’s not…any idea what that is? I know it’s not 0, but for convenience in the math I’m going to assume it’s close to 0A…so if the Solar provides 0.5 for what, 6-12 hrs a day (give or take based on sun conditions and position), then in rough terrible estimations this means that it needs solar 3X as much as it records each day. So, if it gets 6 hours of good sun, then it should be able to record roughly 2 full hours a day = 120 min or about 5 whole minutes per hour on average that’s 25 12-second events per hour or one every 2.4 minutes. That’s pretty often. If you get more sun then you could do more. If you have less activity you might be able to split that power between 2 WCO’s and be okay.

I’m not an electrician, just using logic, and I know the WCO doesn’t suspend at 0A, but it seems like it’s feasible if you aren’t in a really high-traffic area.

[Newshound]

@carverofchoice

That is actually great. So I assume it’s 1.45A while it’s actually actively recording, and it must be significantly lower when it’s not

Actually, I just plugged the cam in with a voltage/current monitor attached when it was simply recharging. So that may include moving it, but is mostly just the recharge rate because I would have let it settle.

The maximum rate of absorption has nothing to do with its present operational needs. Charging can be much higher. So present needs are part of the total, but a simple current-limiting resistor is more prevalent on what the battery wants to recharge.

[bobinpensacola]

Installed Panel @ 9am today. No sun, full cloud cover, dark dismal day. At install time the camera was at 90% charge. At 4pm the camera was at 97% with no motions recorded during the day. I’m very happy!

[Bam]

ever though there is cloud cover, some UV rays do get through clouds allowing the panel to work to a degree. this is why it is also possible to get sun burnt on some cloudy days just not to the same effect.

[carverofchoice]

So it went up about 1% per hour on average with no visible sun and no events. Thanks for posting that. Not bad. It should charge faster on sunny days too. It will be interesting to see how well it charges in different conditions and such. But considering the battery already lasts pretty long, even if it never charged faster or better than 1% per hour, that should be sufficient to keep it charged for the most part. That will be awesome.

[Newshound]

Mine is covered with snow. So no recharging anything, lol.

[R.Good]

You could use the spotlight connector to split 2 cameras assuming you didn’t need a wide distance from the cameras… Still need 2 kits thought. But hey… you could use that solar panel for something else

Really I just wanted to see what the fit was using the spotlight connector.

[LonnieM]

Normal solar panels do not utilize UV light at all, and only work in the visible spectrum (which also obviously makes it through clouds, as otherwise it would be complete darkness).

While it is more energetic, UV only makes up 4% of sunlight, so going to the extra effort to design a panel to support it wouldn’t make much difference.

Making panels that can utilize UV isn’t impossible, but it makes more sense if the panel is transparent and used in place of a UV filtering, like this:

These solar panels don’t need the sun to produce energy

(Too bad the title is completely misleading).

[carverofchoice]

Anyone going to try hooking one of these up to the Video Doorbell Pro? Would’ve been handy growing up…our backyard neighbors and us would always go to each others houses through the fences. We could’ve had one of these at the fence to “knock” in a way. Then if you could charge them by solar, all the better! Of course, the plug is adapted to fit the WCO specifically, but I’m sure I could jury-rig it to be waterproof and work with a VDBPros…kind of tempting honestly.

Disclaimer, Wyze doesn’t recommend trying this, you could void your warranty, it hasn’t IP been tested for this, etc, etc…I was just saying I’M personally tempted to try.

[R.Good]

Dang you @carverofchoice. Now I’m tempted. But first… I need a fence.

I’ll let you know when I get one. Then it’s on.

[nopal62]

I just connected my solar panel and in the first hour it dropped 1% (it’s late afternoon but still sunny). I rechecked the connections and unplugged and reset the main connector. It seems to holding the same % now.

My question is: how do I know it’s working (other than waiting)? I’ve toggled the Accessory button ON. And I see a charge icon next to the percentage, but I honestly can’t remember if it was there or not before.

[Newshound]

You mostly have to wait until the end of a sunny day. If you play with the cam much, you might not even see the charge increase. You might even see it decrease. It doesn’t charge fast, but it doesn’t really need to.

[nopal62]

Thanks. I guess I have to be patient.