Random Geekage » solar panel http://kevinisageek.org Randomness, geekery and whatever else I feel like Thu, 20 May 2010 10:29:06 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0 I have the power! http://kevinisageek.org/2009/10/23/i-have-the-power/ http://kevinisageek.org/2009/10/23/i-have-the-power/#comments Fri, 23 Oct 2009 21:28:24 +0000 Kevin http://kevinisageek.org/?p=648 A few weeks ago I purchased a cheap solar panel for charging my tech while out and about. My original plan was to get 2 of them and attach them to my XTL. When it arrived it was much much smaller than I anticipated.  I can fit 5 across the PALS webbing on my XTL.

The panel is a simple affair. Has an internal lithium battery that can be charged via USB to give a full charge before going outdoors and also has a pop out secondary panel for faster charging. Comes with a bunch of adapters for various devices.

Attaching it to my XTL is pretty simple. I glued 2 Maxpedition Tacties which I had modified to give improved functionality (in my opinion) to the back of the panel. I was origially going to film it but my audience is not dumb, gluing 2 things together hardly qualifies as video material.

Malice clips could be used as an alternative to the tacties. I would prefer to use them but I can’t find any retailers in the UK that stock them and I am not paying £20 to ship 4 bits of plastic from America.

The proof of concept works well I think. Sags a little but that’s due to a lack of interweaving that would normally happen on PALS. I attempted to glue in a loop of webbing on each tactie but that failed.

panel installed

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