Works great on Military 24V Systems! I bought this initially to charge my 1989 M998 batteries. They are 5 year old AGM’s and would go low if I didn’t start it up once a week. Problem solved. Ordered a 2nd one for my M934A1 Expandable Communications truck. Again it works great! Am ordering a third one for my M923A2 Beats the crap out of the tiny military battery minder with a 4″ square panel.
It works So this type of panel has my general criticisms of series vs. parallel arrangement issues and the wavelength it’s tuned to. It’s not the best for generating power is shaded or partially shaded areas and any shade on part of the panel nearly disables the output.However, it has a build-in charge controller for 12V batteries which is nice in some ways and it includes easy to use mounting brackets. This is great for some applications such as charging my battery I use to power the water pump that I use with my rain water collectors.
No need for a jump start Got tired of having to jump start my 24 volt bull dozer. I don’t use the dozer often enough to keep the batteries fully charged. This solved that problem. Now the dozer is always ready for work no matter how long I let it sit between usage.
If there isn’t enough light this actually drains the battery I found that even if the indicator LED is blinking red, indicating that it is charging the battery, the controller could actually be draining your battery instead of charging it. It’s only about a 2.5mA drain, but it’s constant night and cloudy day. This affects its usefulness as a maintainer as after a week or two of rainy weather it could lead to a dead battery that wouldn’t be dead if you didn’t have this “maintaining” it.I’ll still try to use it. I’ll have to unplug it at night and during cloudy days though. It would have been nice if I could just set it up and forget it. I tried to check the charge current on a good bright day, but it makes my ammeter jump around and I can’t get a good reading. I blame the blinking LED for making the current jump around so much, but I think at times I’m getting about 100mA in bright sunshine.
Let the sun shine This charges my 24v battery powered boat lift and is the only power source. Living in Florida means, typically, sunshine is not a problem so this works for me.
Works good to supplement charge on LiftMaster LA500 gate I had a solar panel on my gate wired directly into to the LA500 main board, which has a built in charge controller. The problem with the Lift Master built in charge controller is that it floats the batteries at 24.5 volts, and it needs to be around 26 to maximize battery life. Wired this panel directly to the battery and it floats it right 25.8-25.9 while also offsetting the constant drain of my Remootio WiFi gate opener.The price is a bit high for what it is, but itâs nice not having to wire in a separate charge controllers
WTFOver –
Works great on Military 24V Systems!
I bought this initially to charge my 1989 M998 batteries. They are 5 year old AGM’s and would go low if I didn’t start it up once a week. Problem solved. Ordered a 2nd one for my M934A1 Expandable Communications truck. Again it works great! Am ordering a third one for my M923A2 Beats the crap out of the tiny military battery minder with a 4″ square panel.
Dark Wing Duck –
It works
So this type of panel has my general criticisms of series vs. parallel arrangement issues and the wavelength it’s tuned to. It’s not the best for generating power is shaded or partially shaded areas and any shade on part of the panel nearly disables the output.However, it has a build-in charge controller for 12V batteries which is nice in some ways and it includes easy to use mounting brackets. This is great for some applications such as charging my battery I use to power the water pump that I use with my rain water collectors.
alton m. –
well made product
works well in my dozer 24 volt system
Brian –
No need for a jump start
Got tired of having to jump start my 24 volt bull dozer. I don’t use the dozer often enough to keep the batteries fully charged. This solved that problem. Now the dozer is always ready for work no matter how long I let it sit between usage.
The Dancing Banana –
If there isn’t enough light this actually drains the battery
I found that even if the indicator LED is blinking red, indicating that it is charging the battery, the controller could actually be draining your battery instead of charging it. It’s only about a 2.5mA drain, but it’s constant night and cloudy day. This affects its usefulness as a maintainer as after a week or two of rainy weather it could lead to a dead battery that wouldn’t be dead if you didn’t have this “maintaining” it.I’ll still try to use it. I’ll have to unplug it at night and during cloudy days though. It would have been nice if I could just set it up and forget it. I tried to check the charge current on a good bright day, but it makes my ammeter jump around and I can’t get a good reading. I blame the blinking LED for making the current jump around so much, but I think at times I’m getting about 100mA in bright sunshine.
Thomas J Powell –
Let the sun shine
This charges my 24v battery powered boat lift and is the only power source. Living in Florida means, typically, sunshine is not a problem so this works for me.
Jason McCoy –
Works good to supplement charge on LiftMaster LA500 gate
I had a solar panel on my gate wired directly into to the LA500 main board, which has a built in charge controller. The problem with the Lift Master built in charge controller is that it floats the batteries at 24.5 volts, and it needs to be around 26 to maximize battery life. Wired this panel directly to the battery and it floats it right 25.8-25.9 while also offsetting the constant drain of my Remootio WiFi gate opener.The price is a bit high for what it is, but itâs nice not having to wire in a separate charge controllers
Miner –
Solid construction, works well.
Comes firmly pre-wired, ready to use, with versatile mounting hardware. Very satisfied.