Solar Mod for improved gas mileage

[infrno187]

I was researching solar packages for a house and I found this peel and stick solar panes, and I thought, "I wonder why someone hasnt put these on a hybrid to improve EV mode?"

 

I came across this: http://www.solarelectricalvehicles.com/

 

However, I can not find anything like this for the Ford Fusion. I am looking for any number of mods, that charge the hybrid battery while the car is parked or driving. I was also looking for a solar mod that runs the AC while the car is parked to keep it from getting "melt your skin hot." If anyone has any information about this kind of mod, please let me know.

[kuzzi]

Makes sense. To keep the AC running on a "low" demand setting, it only takes 500 watts or so. Can someone confirm this with scan gauge?

 

Should be enough space on the roof (without a sunroof) to put the high dollar flexible panels and you might stretch to that 500 watts.

 

Programming and charge controllers will make this quite expensive for little benefit. Same goes for additional batteries. An extra 215 watts on that Prius in the link won't do much of anything for driving range, it would just mean starting the journey with a high battery SOC. The extra batteries are where it's at. A solar panel on an Energi would be ideal since it can be selected to run in electric only and you would not need to plug it in away from home if parked in sunlight.

 

It can be used to run AC constantly when parked in a low setting, but I don't want to pay for someone to develop the programming to mess with this type of thing.

Edited May 23, 2014 by kuzzi

[infrno187]

A/C:

It doesnt have to run the AC per se, even if it just circulated air via a fan it would be fine. But I can see this being fairly complicated.

 

Battery Charge:

This however seems pretty straight forward and simple. Starting with a full battery would extend the amount of EV range, which would increase the efficiency, also it would give some free charge while driving. The only thing that would be needed to charge the battery are the panels and the power management connected to the batteries. That should not be very different from what is in an "off the grid" house, but scaled down. The panels are not that expensive, the flexible peel and stick kind sold on amazon, 250 sf, for about $300. That's much bigger than the area of the Fusion roof. I think its doable and affordable.

[GrySql]

While it is a great idea and the future may hold such technological marvels I don't know if the FFH can handle this.

Seems like the main problem with the 'doable' part is to get the FFH's computer to accept this electrical intrusion that is not programmed into it's very complicated software. Ford uses proprietal software that they don't share.

 

OTOH, it might be just as simple as plugging it into the dash power port....

 

They do sell these:

[murphy]

One of the solar panels on the roof of my house is 39" by 65" and is rated at 250 watts when the sun impacts the panel at 90 degrees. The output voltage is 30 volts DC. How would you charge a 300 volt battery with that? There can't be two independent charge controllers connected to a Li-Ion battery so direct charging with DC is not possible. Overcharging a Li-Ion battery is very dangerous. They get very hot and catch fire.

 

Updated to remove a comment that only applied to an Energi. I wasn't paying attention to which forum I was posting in.

Edited May 24, 2014 by murphy

[corncobs]

One of the solar panels on the roof of my house is 39" by 65" and is rated at 250 watts when the sun impacts the panel at 90 degrees. The output voltage is 30 volts DC. How would you charge a 300 volt battery with that? It can't be converted to 120 volts AC and fed to the charge port because the charge port wants to see about 12 amps at 120 volts AC. Ignoring inverter efficiency the most available would be 250 / 120 = 2.08 amps. There can't be two independent charge controllers connected to a Li-Ion battery so direct charging with DC is not possible. Overcharging a Li-Ion battery is very dangerous. They get very hot and catch fire.

I remember this isn't it funny how these things are coming back to life every so often.

 

I like the idea even just for running a small little A/C to help keeping the car cooler in summer.

[Easy Rider]

A/C:

It doesnt have to run the AC per se, even if it just circulated air via a fan it would be fine. But I can see this being fairly complicated.

 

Battery Charge:

I think its doable and affordable.

 

First, you can buy a little solar fan that goes into a cracked side window for about $20. Reports are that they help a little.

 

Second, that solar battery charging thing won't be simple at all.

You have to scale the solar cell voltage UP to that of the hybrid battery AND have some circuitry to prevent over-charging.

Then the amount of energy you actually gain won't be significant without a huge array of panels.

Lastly, even if you had enough panels, you don't have enough battery capacity to make it worth while.......except on the plug-in Energi models.

[infrno187]

Was there already a thread for this? I looked extensively and did not see one. I apologize if I am rehashing some old topic.

[Easy Rider]

The output voltage is 30 volts DC. How would you charge a 300 volt battery with that?

 

You connect 10 or 11 of them in series !!

Like I said, neither practical nor cheap.

[corncobs]

Was there already a thread for this? I looked extensively and did not see one. I apologize if I am rehashing some old topic.

No need to apologize its barried under something nonspecific and it wasn't an obvious header like you created plus the concept in the link is interesting.

It also shows that people driving a FE car are thinking about additional ways to use other (free) energy sources.

 

There are few car manufactures where it is or has been an option but as we know the power output is very limited and for larger applications impractical.

 

I thought the Leaf has a small solar panel on rear roof but I don't what it's used for.

Edited May 24, 2014 by corncobs

[murphy]

It might be possible to rig up a small panel to trickle charge the 12 volt battery to avoid the dead 12 volt battery problem. However if the car spends a lot of time in a garage that isn't going to work unless the panel is on the roof of the garage.

[Sleddog]

With enough money you can do anything. The issue of charging the HVB with a solar cell is one of thing that will hold you back. The idea of providing enough power to run the a/c with a solar cell is interesting. But, the software programming AND interfacing another power source into this very complicated system makes it a no go, With that said, if you were to integrate a "selector switch" to direct power to the a/c components from either the normal power systems or a regulated solar panel with some type of storage system could be possible.

 

Would it be worth it, IMO, no. The cost, research time and possible problems/damage to the cars systems If a mistake is made, are just some of the things to consider.

[hybridbear]

Makes sense. To keep the AC running on a "low" demand setting, it only takes 500 watts or so. Can someone confirm this with scan gauge?

I haven't been tracking AC use for long with my Torque Pro app and haven't used AC much since it's still cool here in Mpls, but the lowest AC power I've seen is 1.0 kW. Peak was about 3 kW, but it's never been turned on very high.

[acdii]

If you have an Energi model, running solar panels with an inverter, 12v to 120V that matches the panels output is something that could be done. How long it takes to recharge depends on how much sunlight the panel can get. Unfortunately the FFH does not have household charge circuitry, so its not a viable solution, and adding it could impact its performance or do irreparable damage to the system.

 

Edit, One of the projects I am working on is a transport for my RC planes. Since I need to use AC for charging the flight packs, I am going to install a 12v Deep Cycle battery with wiring. To keep it charged up I will be installing a solar panel on the roof of the trailer. This will keep the battery in peak condition when not in use, and provide me all the power I need with a 1200 watt inverter. I will install LED lighting inside, along with a work bench. I can also use it to charge up the packs for power tools, like a drill or Dremel tool.

Edited May 26, 2014 by acdii

[MaineFusion]

I'd agree with other comments here that adding such solar panels to a FFH doesn't sound like a very good idea and probably wouldn't be worth the expense/risk. Personally, even if this was risk free, it wouldn't be worthwhile because I park in a parking garage at work and a garage at home. As a result, I'd get precious little electricity from them.