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Solar Tracker — Parallax Forums

Solar Tracker

Sonny WindwaterSonny Windwater Posts: 7
edited 2008-12-07 21:34 in General Discussion
Hello all,

We are building a solar tracker for school. Have any done this before? And if you have, did you use small solar panels (eg yard lites) or photoresistors? We are leaning toward the resistors. I do believe that is the way to go.

Thanx in advance

Gerry aka SWW

Thanx been perusing forums.. they are great

Post Edited (Sonny Windwater) : 11/10/2008 4:16:17 AM GMT

Comments

  • SRLMSRLM Posts: 5,045
    edited 2008-11-09 21:20
    Please add a subject line.

    Anyway, an array of photo resisters would work, and be easier than the mini solar panels. It's been done before, so some searching should turn up some results.
  • Chris SavageChris Savage Parallax Engineering Posts: 14,406
    edited 2008-11-09 22:48
    You can edit your message and add a subject line by clicking the pencil icon to the top right of the message.

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    Chris Savage
    Parallax Engineering
  • Beau SchwabeBeau Schwabe Posts: 6,568
    edited 2008-11-10 06:15
    Sonny Windwater,

    Check about half-way down this tread for a tube-shadow method for detecting the sun's position.

    http://forums.parallax.com/showthread.php?p=584537

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    Beau Schwabe

    IC Layout Engineer
    Parallax, Inc.
  • Sonny WindwaterSonny Windwater Posts: 7
    edited 2008-12-07 14:17
    Hello all,

    We successfully built and coded the tracker, we used 4 photo resistors for azimuth and 3 for elevation. using an RCTIME and alot of IF AND THEN's. It has 35 different positions it can go to (7 azimuth & 5 elevation). It seems to work quite well. We incorporated LBT (Little Black Tube) technology as it bumped the sensitivity way up. each PR had its own LBT pointing at different angles. We added a sleep command for nighttime as it does run off a battery that the panel charges. Very fun project, Have also made 'demo' codes so that we can emulate winter and summer extremes, or just make it move wherever we want it to.

    Gerry aka SWW
  • ZootZoot Posts: 2,227
    edited 2008-12-07 15:31
    This sounds very cool and useful too. Can you post schematics, code and photos in the Completed Projects forums? I'm sure a lot of forum members would like to see the results of your work.

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    When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro. -- HST

    1uffakind.com/robots/povBitMapBuilder.php
    1uffakind.com/robots/resistorLadder.php
  • Sonny WindwaterSonny Windwater Posts: 7
    edited 2008-12-07 16:10
    Will do when we get it all documents done, and the final screws driven in.
  • Beau SchwabeBeau Schwabe Posts: 6,568
    edited 2008-12-07 21:34
    Sonny Windwater,

    Congratulations!... I'm glad you got your project working the way you wanted. looking forward to the details.

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    Beau Schwabe

    IC Layout Engineer
    Parallax, Inc.
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