The students completed the final design and fabricated the solar tracking mechanism and sensor station. The station consists of a servo that swivels the panel and housing (black) along an axis concentric to the mounting pole (white). A limit switch was installed to make sure that the panel could be rotated back to a home position when the sun went down. The servo then turns the housing until the switch is pressed and then turns the servo off. The photocell, servo, limit switch, and pv panel wiring is fed down through the mounting pole and then into the sensor station. We installed it in the garden, and it seems to be working just fine. Some adjustments will need to be made because the wires inside the mechanism can sometimes get tangled in the servo motor, causing the solar panel not to return to a home position when the light level is low (night time).
Thursday, April 15, 2010
Sensor Station Installation Complete
The students completed the final design and fabricated the solar tracking mechanism and sensor station. The station consists of a servo that swivels the panel and housing (black) along an axis concentric to the mounting pole (white). A limit switch was installed to make sure that the panel could be rotated back to a home position when the sun went down. The servo then turns the housing until the switch is pressed and then turns the servo off. The photocell, servo, limit switch, and pv panel wiring is fed down through the mounting pole and then into the sensor station. We installed it in the garden, and it seems to be working just fine. Some adjustments will need to be made because the wires inside the mechanism can sometimes get tangled in the servo motor, causing the solar panel not to return to a home position when the light level is low (night time).
