Solar Panel for CPAP

General Discussion on any topic relating to CPAP and/or Sleep Apnea.
Watchoverya
Posts: 1
Joined: Sat Mar 25, 2023 8:59 am

Solar Panel for CPAP

Post by Watchoverya » Sat Mar 25, 2023 9:01 am

I am looking for recommendations for a solar panel which will charge my two BPS C-100 batteries. Any recommendations?

Lane101
Posts: 97
Joined: Sat Jul 07, 2018 12:03 pm

Re: Solar Panel for CPAP

Post by Lane101 » Fri Mar 31, 2023 3:25 pm

Watchoverya wrote:
Sat Mar 25, 2023 9:01 am
I am looking for recommendations for a solar panel which will charge my two BPS C-100 batteries. Any recommendations?
Please add some details around your likely usage patterns and where/time of year you will be using these batteries for your CPAPs. Also, what is the chemistry of these batteries, are they LiOn or Lead Acid for example? What is the maximum charge rate (amps per hour) that these batteries can handle?

Note you will need both a panel and a charge controller compatible with your batteries for this. For my two 20 amp hour lead acid batteries (home built battery packs) we used a 30 watt solar panel that worked well for a week long camping trip in the middle of the summer with 12-14 charging hours available each day on an almost always sunny beach location. It allowed us to run my CPAP (no humidifier), a fan and charge our phones. Note that at a max 80% agm battery allowable discharge these batteries offered us enough power for 3 days of use without charging so we could handle up to two bad weather days in a row before running out of juice.

Other times of the year with less daylight and more clouds a panel with at least double the wattage would have been required as perhaps only 4 - 5 good charging hours could be counted on and with clouds panel output can drop from 20-90%.