I have an off-grid 24volt existing system using 8 x 80 watt 2volt, wired at 24volts, mono solar panels with deep cycle batteries,operating now. I have been given a 240 2volt polly cryst. panel. Can I add this panel to existing panels as above. Thank you, dumb solar man
Assuming that you have / will upgrade wiring sizes to carry the extra wattage, that the new total wattage resulting from the addition doesn't overload any existing charge controller, diodes and / or inverter you have installed, then paralleling it straight into one of the other 2 volt groups should do nothing but add current to the system. True, it will be somewhat imbalanced, but it will work. Your other options would be to reconfigure everything down to it's native 2 V configuration which will raise current and lower voltage, with the additional panel creating the additional current to raise the wattage or to put it in series with the other 4 panel clusters so that you would get 36 V and additional current to account for the raised wattage. One last approach might be to set it up on another battery bank of it's own (small and at 2 V) to then connect to the same inverter. You'd be getting more power and storage capability that way, sort of a partial backup system, really, that will take some of the load off the other components to help extend their useful lives and get a bit more flexibility into it as well. The choice is yours here. That is all the ways that the system can be connected in, assuming everything in the first sentence checks out;-) It's difficult to make a recommendation without knowing what other components are in use and what the maximum ratings they carry are. Just remember that parallel connections add current and voltage stays the same, series connections add voltage and the current remains the same and you can figure out what to do with this thing to help you if you stay within maximum ratings for the charge controller, diodes and / or inverter involved. Good luck and stay safe!
