Tried searching but got many links to off grid stuff. Are they any decent network cams that are solar powered so I don't have to run power or network to them?
Solar powered ip cams?
- Thread starter JimLS
- Start date
mat200
IPCT Contributor
- Jan 17, 2017
- 18,248
- 30,598
Hi @JimLS
If you plan to run the camera 24x7 you will need a larger solar panel and battery setup. Most likely you would need to assemble this yourself from component parts.
The typical consumer solar powered cameras are designed for motion detection activated video capture
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That's what I was thinking. It is fairly straight forward to size the panel and battery from the camera power requirements. Camera selection is one piece. Thinking I might find some on other similar installations.
Did some estimating... For a wired IP camera with IR it's about 4W daytime and 10 W at night. Another 6W for a router or similar to do wifi. For a couple days of no sun I need about 200 Ah from a 12V battery to limit discharge to 50% (as I think is recommended for lead acid). Looked up a battery for my Tacoma and it is 60 Ah. So I need 3 of those. Or some newer technology. Plus a 200W panel. I have some spare irrigation valve wiring nearby I could use for low voltage power so that seems like a better plan.
I tried this with 1 x 100W solar panel and 4 x 18ah sealed lead acid batteries in a series/parallel setup for 24V ubiquity solar max controller. It ran a 4mp camera all summer no problem but Winter is where it ran out of juice. I'm Adding another 100 w panel and couple more batteries next winter.
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CCTVCam
Known around here
- Sep 25, 2017
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Looks good but remember with solar, the needs have to be based on the worst days of winter as these are the shortest days. Also, if where you live suffers dark rainy or snowy days for days on end, then your battery needs to last long enough to cover those periods. If you might get a full week of continuos rain and dark skies during winter, then it needs to last that period. You alos need sufficient charge left to cover the panel recharging at a slow rate if it's still dark and dreary afterwards and due to the short days. It also needs a panel capable of keeping it fully charged in the weather before such an event because a 1/2 full battery is only going to last 1/2 as long when the sun isn't present. When I looked at this, sizing was quite tricky and potential battery & panel quite expensive due to the oversizing needed to cover winter / bad weather periods. Obviously we may have less sun hours over here than you so needs are very location dependent. Conclusion I came to was solar is fine for places like Florida, Cuba, Caribbean etc. For northern latitudes, it can very difficult to ensure you don't get outages.