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wdwflash

Solar lantern

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wdwflash

I just bought a light/lantern at Samadera's (Snookyville) that has an attachable solar charger. You can charge it with the sun, then with provided adapters and cables charge you phone and maybe a computer/tablet off of the lantern. Its $25. and a real slick unit. (They only had three of them left.)It comes with a bunch of mobile phone adapters, the solar charge, lantern and ac/dc charger. It says the charger is 1.7 watt poly-crystalline cells and the light is a 1 watt led.

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Parrothead

I have seen some lanterns around town with small panels on the top of them. They were LED lamps as well. It would be interesting to see how many hours you could get out of one of them. LEDs don't use much power.

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wdwflash

The solar charger is about 6in by 6in. I tried my cell phone on it today and it does say that it is charging. I tried the lantern last night and its great.

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Parrothead

Hey,

 

How is that lantern working out? Still doing okay? Charging okay during the day? 

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wdwflash

Its great. I used it last week during the short power outages and I can use it to charge my cell phone for free.

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wdwflash

During the latest power outage I had forgotten to charge my mobile hotspot device. I hooked it up to the lantern and it charged the wifi hotspot. Then when the sun comes out I'll just charge the lantern with the solar panel. Pretty slick to my thinking. It also charges phones. One less electrical Kilowatt hour money drain

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Parrothead

I don't know if I told you, Dave, but I bought some batteries, battery chargers and voltage inverters. One of the inverters didn't work. But, the other did. So, I power my computer, a second 24" monitor, and all accessories, by the batteries. Oh, I have a stand fan as well, that runs off them. They are three (3) 12vdc, 120 AH batteries, connected in parallel, They are connected to an automatic charger / inverter that has a rating of 800 watts continuous. So far, it has done quite well during all the power cuts we have had recently. 

 

I have another, single 150 AH, 12vdc battery that runs a 400 watt inverter. It powers my modem, router, and refrigerator. I have a separate 20 ampere charger that maintains that battery. 

 

So far, so good. I do need to buy another fan or two, and a couple of lamps to be powered during a power cut. 

 

I finally found a "good" quality solar panel company, Yingli, to buy from. They offer 285 watt panels. I am going to buy one and see how it works. If I like it well enough, I will have them ship me a second one. All should be good afterward. I can run just about everything I need, off that. I should have a power bill that drops to almost nothing, then.

Edited by Paul
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wdwflash

Paul, keep me posted on the solar stuff. Is this company in Cambodia or are you having it shipped from out of country. I just spent almost two months trying to get a 100lb box shipped from the US to Cambo. (extremely expensive!) If it was under 70lb I could have gone with postal EMS which is wonderful, you don't really deal with customs, its a LOT cheaper and you can track it. BTW/ From being on ships, I had a lot of exposure to bank of batteries. (got a lot of holes in my uniforms working with them.)

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Parrothead

The guy I am talking to is based in Singapore. However, they originate out of China. Yingli Solar
 
I was communicating with a guy from a solar supply house in the US. I was trying to get him to drop ship the panel(s) here, rather than shipping them directly from the US. He couldn't do it. You do NOT want to know the prices he gave me to do so! 
 
When I contacted Yingli's guy in Singapore. He said they have a minimum $50 USD shipping cost, to the cost of the panel. I have not inquired for the shipping cost for more than one panel. Here is what he sent to me, regarding pricing for one (1) 285 watt solar panel:

 

 

The price for one unit of our poly 285W would be US$ 210.90 + US$ 50 (shipping cost) CIF Cambodia port.

 

In my opinion, not a bad price, at .74c US per watt, plus shipping. All said and done, only .92c USD per watt, shipped. 
 
In the following folder, I have a sub-folder titled "_Yingli_Panels". Go to it and you will see the specs on their panels, as PDFs. Click here to view the folder on the Copy.com site.

Edited by Paul

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wdwflash

I am in the process of shipping a 100lb box from America. What a pain the the a*s. First finding someone to ship it from America and do the paperwork (lots of places said they do not ship to Cambodia.) Second getting a customs clearance house/freight forwarder in Cambodia to give me an estimate of costs. This whole process took a month and a half, and its very expensive.

 

Also, Cambodia joined the WTO and the WTO made them lower the 100% duty, so the Cambodian thieves (government) lowered the import duty, but tacked on a "luxury tax" and a "VAT," but they are not import tax's. You can get around some tax by declaring that its "personal affects," but once again good luck as the government has the final say.

 

If you ship by postal EMS (under 70lb), you don't have to deal with all the BS and when sent from the US, its at the Snooky PO in 10 days.

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