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Power Raspberry PI using Solar Panel

feiticeir0

Hi all.

Following a project - AllSky - taking photos all night at the sky - I want to place the PI - Raspberry PI 4 B+ 4GB memory using a SSD NVMe 512GB  - where I don't have a power outlet.

I've the following setup:

- Solar Panel -

  • max power: 20W
  • Vmpp: 18.2V
  • Voc: 22.6V
  • Impp: 1.12A
  • short-circuit: 1.18A

image

That connects to a Waveshare Solar Power Manager (C), that is powered by 3x 18650 batteries - each battery has 3350mAh - NCR18650B.

imageimage

I've set the setup voltage switch for 12V - the same as the solar panel.

image

I don't have a problem with the charging. It charges very well, to full charge.

My problem is, it just wont last all night.

Starting to take pictures at 21:30 (9pm), it only lasts to (the last picture taken) 3:44 (3:44am) . Just over 6h.. This can't be right.

My question is - what can I do to make it last longer. Should I buy more powerful batteries - like 5000mAh or more ? Chose other solar charger ?

I have the Raspberry PI Lite version - and I've disabled some unwanted services like - bluetooth, avahi-daemon, triggerhappy, etc.. I even disabled the status LEDS... Slight smile

Any idea would be great.

Thank you

Parents

  • Finger-in-the-air measurement came out to 6 hours. There's about 30Wh of energy in three cells total (that's more realistic than assuming that they support precisely what they are labeled as), and if you're running a Pi and SSD, I guessed at 5W, but there will be some losses too in conversion. So that's ballpark 6 hours, maybe +- 1 hour for the conversion losses and actual battery capability being slightly different than my guess). I think if you don't wish to change hardware and if OS and software can not be tweaked further then the battery is possibly the current bottleneck (but I've no idea if more solar capability is needed if the battery size is increased).  

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  • Finger-in-the-air measurement came out to 6 hours. There's about 30Wh of energy in three cells total (that's more realistic than assuming that they support precisely what they are labeled as), and if you're running a Pi and SSD, I guessed at 5W, but there will be some losses too in conversion. So that's ballpark 6 hours, maybe +- 1 hour for the conversion losses and actual battery capability being slightly different than my guess). I think if you don't wish to change hardware and if OS and software can not be tweaked further then the battery is possibly the current bottleneck (but I've no idea if more solar capability is needed if the battery size is increased).  

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