I think this is a beautiful setup. A great and very classy design. The addition of volt and amp meters is a bit hilarious (but I love it - next step up would be to make those wireless as well so you could minotor from inside the house )
A few comments on batteries though, lead-acid batteries to be specific, as that is what most will use due to plain economics (Li-On are just too pricey for most and for applications like these where space and weight is of lesser importance).
What really kills a battery over time is heat. Cold rarely harms a battery, just lowers the instantly available capacity, fully restored when temperature has increased. And as long as a battery is charged, it will not freeze and sustain damage until somewhere near -70C/-95F - which is pretty darn cold
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If thinking “car battery” as a “regular” lead-acid battery, they are designed to provide a lot of current during a short amount of time (to start the car) and are quickly killed by discharging them with a small current over a longer period of time. “Marine”, “house”, or “deep-discharge” batteries are designed for those scenarios and can handle slow discharges over time w/o sustaining any damage. How far you’d go can always be disputed, and at the end it is a result of how much charging capacity that is available. 50% is a safe level, but many batteries can go down to 20% as well or below w/o sustaining damage. At that level though, you will need to provide a higher charging current in order to “lift” the battery voltage up (need to have enough to go past the “tipping point”).
Sorry if this was a bit deep, but storage batteries has always been fascinating and I used to work with them in telecommunications facilities. Saw all kinds of misconceptions - and abuse - when it came to batteries. Often one of the biggest investments, and a piece of equipment you really hoped you never would need to use…
Thanks Wellcraft! I use a sealed lead acid (SLA) deep cycle battery in this particular setup as the power requirements aren’t that high. I don’t need a huge battery bank. For a previous camera setup in my side yard, I used a similar setup but the battery was a bit undersized. I would regularly run that down to ~25% or so (rainy/cloudy days) and it only lasted about 6 months before it required replacement. Additionally, as you said, heat is a battery killer for sure. I purposely designed this with slats to provide shade AND provide air circulation via wind. The top foot or so of slats are sealed off from the inside to protect the electronics from sideways rain, but the rest is open on all sides and it remains quite cool inside even on the hottest Florida days.
I also have a solar pergola I am finishing up which covers my BBQ grill and me when I’m using it. I have designed it to provide power for led lights, wyze cams, landscape lighting, a marine audio system, and a single AC outlet so I can run accessories (pressure washer, power tools, etc.) in my back yard, I have two 235 Watt panels as roofing providing the juice. The total load on this project is much more substantial and requires 4 flooded deep cycle batteries (2 for the cameras, DC lighting and accessories, and 2 to be connected to an inverter to provide the AC for the outlet, small ceiling fan, etc. Of course, these batteries will require regular maintenance and I’ll have to watch them closer.
I have the meters on the mailbox just to check the health occasionally when I go to get my mail. I can look in at a glance (through the slats on the back) and see if I have current flowing when i should (panel and charge controller health) and also check the voltage to see how my battery is doing. I’m a bit of a nerd that way!
@buccscott, as said before (hopefully that message didn’t get muddled up in the battery tech ramblings…), you have put together an awesome solution - that is also very stylish!
Next step: battery monitoring over WiFi (but you could of course just put a Wyze inside the base, pointing it towards the two displays - easier but not as “sophisticated”)
I don’t see why not. The Pan has a little more power consumption, but not enough to make a huge difference. Your backup might be 2 days instead of the 2.5 @buccscott gets, for example. I don’t have a Pan Cam, but I believe they run off the same power bricks as the regular camera does.
Thanks for the compliment. I’m not sure of the power draw of the pancam. It can’t be that much higher (I guess depending on how much the motors are activated). I would imagine the safe thing to do would be to upsize the battery a bit just to be sure you have enough for daily operation and a few days backup for stormy days.
If you can send me the average power draw of the pancams (Google research or these forums) I’ll run the math and tell you if you should upsize the battery or panel. It’s a bit subjective depending on how many days of backup you’d like etc.
One must be careful not to conflate power consumption over time (watt-hours) with peak power draw (watts or amps). Peak power draw occurs any time the motors are running, the camera is activated, how much processing is occurring, if a bridge is attached, and night vision is on. It isn’t related to how often the motors are used.
Average power consumption, on the other hand, does depend on how much the motors are used.
Therefore, one must not only ensure that the battery capacity is sufficient to cover the average power consumed over time, but also ensure that the power supply can deliver sufficient peak current at any given moment. We know for the Pan that this could potentially be up to 2 amps.
You can purchase a simple USB meter (about 5-10 dollars on Amazon) to place inline which will provide you the actual Voltage/Amperage (some do wattage) draw.
You want to get the average wattage use per hour during the day and also at night (with IR (at night), motors, wifi radio all on). Add the average value for your day hours and night hours (i.e. 10 hours day + 14 hours night). This will give you the average watt hours used per day. You’ll use this to properly size your battery and panel.
Example:. 1A x 5v = 5 watts per hour (day)
2A x 5v = 10 watts per hour (night)
5w x 10 hrs = 50 day
10w x 14hrs = 140 night
50 + 140 = 190 watt hours per day
A 12v 35Ah battery provides you with 420 watt hours when fully charged. Given you only want to discharge your battery to 50% for long term health, you have 210 watt hours for daily use. In my hypothetical example above this would be the minimum battery size necessary. It would work on a daily basis, but you’d have no real reserve capacity. You would have to have full sun every day. You would have an extra day in an emergency, but long term your battery would need to be replaced in short order. In this specific scenario, I would use a 100Ah battery to give me a few days of backup power. This would also necessitate a larger solar panel.
Once you determine the battery size you need then size your panel. The panels normal operating current should equal 5-10% of the Ah capacity of the battery. So, for a 100Ah battery, your panel/charge controller should output 5-10A consistently to charge it properly. This would be a 12v 100 watt panel (5.5A imp) minimum for the 100Ah battery.
The numbers I used above are probably a bit high for this specific camera. I can’t stress enough that if you want your setup to work AND last (not be a money pit), borrow or buy the USB test meter and plug your actual numbers into my scenario above and design it properly. You’ll be glad to did, trust me.
Have fun dude, if you need anything else just let me know…
Loki is correct, but any modern power brick with rapid charging capabilities or any 12v deep cycle agm, sla, etc. will work fine for the max 2A current draw. The power bricks might not last long. Though they seem to be making them higher and higher capacity these days. I would be worried if he planned to string button cell watch batteries or even AA’s together.
Oh, don’t forget if you use a larger form factor 12v battery to provide power for several days, you’ll need a 12v to 5v step down ($5) between the battery and the camera if it operates at 5v. I haven’t used or test the pancam yet, but have a project in mind for it I’ll be posting soon.
If you scroll up near the top of this thread, I have a parts list with links (which may or may not be active at this point). If you have any questions, let me know.
While I fancy myself moderately intelligent, I can’t seem to wrap my mind around the calculations and facts regarding electrical draws… Trying to simplify, would these solar panels already equipped with batteries and what is required for battery heath and output not be sufficient?
I’m sure that would power a Wyzecam continuously for a day or two with no issues, my concern is the charge rate of the internal battery via the built in solar panel. I don’t see any specs on the output of the actual solar panel. They are usually 5-7 (occasionally 10) watts max. I am 99.99 percent certain it would not be able to charge the battery fast enough to keep up with the 24/7 power draw of the camera. I’ve been .01% wrong before, but I don’t think so in this case.
This type of solution is ideal for a portable unit (overnight camping, game cam, hiding a camera to catch trespassers, etc.). If that’s what you are going for, I’d say go for it. If you are looking for a permanent solution, I’d recommend a different design. Let me know if I can help.
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