Building Your Own Solar Panel In the Garage

jeroen8 writes "A Dutch guy was able to build his own solar panel in his garage using materials that were a third as expensive as the mass produced solar panels currently available on the European market. He bought his solar cells on eBay and used them to create his own panel. His output price is only 1.20 Euro per Watt Peak (Wp). This makes you wonder if we are paying too much for mass-produced solar panels, which should, in theory, be a lot less expensive than something you create in your garage."

Comments

Once again...

[ddrueding80]

Only cheaper if your time is worth nothing. Still, very cool. But not particularly novel or groundbreaking.

Re:Once again...

[jacquesm]

The folks at http://fieldlines.com/ have been doing this for years. The bigger problems are the sealing of the cells and the fact that since these are most likely rejects the cells might nog give their rated power.

The article summary is dead wrong in suggesting that this is somehow proof that solar cells could be produced cheaper, these cells have probably been hijacked on the way to the recycler.

'making' a solar panel in your garage does not start off with buying solar cells and hooking them up, it starts with sand.

Not Proof New Cells Are Overpriced

[darkmeridian]

The author bought damaged solar cells from eBay, selected the good ones, then soldered those together. Then he jury-rigged his own waterproof casing and electrical connections. Used goods are cheaper but that does not mean new ones are over-priced.

Let us know how long his cells last outside before insinuating all the solar cell producers in the world are selling overpriced gear.

Cells are NEW but also STOLEN

[Anonymous Coward]

I am fairly (95%) certain that these Cells have been stolen, probably by a person working at a solar cell manufacturing plant.
Getting an 'uncounted' batch of 'mixed quality' just screams 'stolen'.. and then the price itself is also cheaper then the raw manufacturing

But they are 'new', extracting Cells from used panels is not cost effective as commercial panels are laminated and string soldered which is very hard to take apart without breaking most of the cells.

Also, when you buy good quality Solar Panels you usually get around 25 years of warranty and the knowledge that they have been throughly safety tested (and designed) so that they won't burn down your house when one cell short circuits or your getting a bit more sun then imagined. I would think that's worth something by itself.

Re:Cells are NEW but also STOLEN

[Hognoxious]

But in both those cases they're second hand, rejects, or both. So the hysterical "OMG we're being ripped off 3x" in the summary is bullshit.

Re:Cells are NEW but also STOLEN

[Zeromous]

an electrical spark is pretty useless for starting a fire without ample combustible gas, or surface area.

I'd be more concerned about my circuit working than catching fire in such a case.

This is not to say one shouldn't be careful. But this burning down the house business is a quite an exaggeration. You'd have to have a helluva a short!