Solar Wireless Bridge 2 camera recommendations

ron351

ron351

Getting the hang of it
Jul 24, 2017
125
51
Looking for someone who can suggest a solar panel setup that will power a wireless bridge antenna to a POE switch and 2 possibly 3 4K POE cameras that won't run out of power overnight.
Nothing very expensive like we see in some parking lots at large stores or setups like some police use.
I could also eliminate the POE switch and come off the 12v to the 12v pigtail on the cameras if better.
This is going to be in a large cemetery and can not run buried wire there due to graves so looking for some system that someone has setup and tried that will work.
Thank you in advance for any input that will guide me to a decision.
Ron
 
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I must be the only one to attempt to install one of these solar systems.
I am contacting this company for guidance as their system seems straight forward.
 
It’s expensive. Expect to spend a several grand on the buildout. That much power draw 24/7 will require large panels and batteries.
 
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Doing some quick math to give you an idea of power requirements:

PoE switch (preferably powered from the 12/24/48v battery) = 5W - 10W baseline
3 cams @ 10W/cam = 30W
PtP airMAX NanoBeam 5AC = 9W

So you are at ~50w continuous power draw 24/7/365. Assuming a 24v battery you are drawing ~.5Ah or 12A per day e.g. (24v / 50W = .48Ah) * 24 hours.

If you purchased a 100Ah 24V lithium phosphate battery that would give you approx ~8days power before the battery was drained 100%. So you need to take that into consideration when buying your panels and also plan for rainy days/weeks where the panels won't get illuminated for a full 10-12 hour day. You can use PVWatts and input your location and it will predict how much energy a solar panel/array will produce based on your historical weather location.
 
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ron351 said:
Looking for someone who can suggest a solar panel setup that will power a wireless bridge antenna to a POE switch and 2 possibly 3 4K POE cameras that won't run out of power overnight.
Nothing very expensive like we see in some parking lots at large stores or setups like some police use.
I could also eliminate the POE switch and come off the 12v to the 12v pigtail on the cameras if better.
This is going to be in a large cemetery and can not run buried wire there due to graves so looking for some system that someone has setup and tried that will work.
Thank you in advance for any input that will guide me to a decision.
Ron
Click to expand...
I built a working prototype of such a system that I’ve had running almost 24/7 since early fall of 2025 in the northeast US.
There are some challenges involved depending on your operating environmental conditions and desired no-sun run time. I’m still working on some issues mainly due to personal time constraints.
It’s been a while since I looked at the component list and costs but I think I’m into it for less than $1000.
 
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My projects take years to finish so I have not done this yet. But I have gotten past the two hardest parts, talking about it and buying the parts! I purchased a 24 volt battery from battery hookup, a din rail POE switch from amazon, two ubiquiti nanostation loco 5s and will buy a 24 volt solar panel. Stuff will be mounted in the junction box and of course, the panel and camera outdoors. In my case, I was going to use the "boobie cam" but I also have the 4k 180 deg camera. I am just going to do one camera so probably will not be limited by the POE burden. Note that with 24 volts you only get half the POE wattage you would with 48 volts. The listing shows 48 volts. I chose the box because it is stainless. I chose the battery since it fits nicely into the box. I can put two in parallel to double the runtime. I went with din rail since it just mounts nicer. I actually have two 100 watt solar panels that I was going to use in series but based on the size I'll be buying the 50W 24 volt panel. Even if I have to buy two to get the required power, it will be smaller than the 100 watt panel. Someone on here built a 3d printed mount for 4 cameras and 2 also. I was just going to mount to a purlin welded to the fence pipe. I've got Empiretec's PFA152e and 150 mounts. And finally, I might use the empiretec junction box PFA6330x if I decide on a second camera. Maybe I will get around to it soon and we can compare notes.
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I've wondered if anyone has used a mesh camera setup. With mesh, each camera could talk to the others if they were not able to communicate with the main router or NVR. This could allow for wider coverage. Quick amazon search yields a Foscam system that is not available. I suppose all your cameras were going to be mounted to a single point and not dispersed throughout the cemetery. If you do have several locals, your battery, solar, switch, would have to be duplicated.
 
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