my friend Rick Arkansas prepper gave me a five watt solar panel a 600 watt
inverter and this battery box and
basically it's just a means of providing some power off the grid here's a battery
tester a 12-volt receptacle but I'm not going to I'm going to totally take this
apart and I'm not going to use a big 12-volt car battery I'm going to use a
much smaller battery probably something along the size of a motorcycle battery
here's why a big 12-volt car battery would take a week for a 5 watt panel the
charge back up from about midway dead and all I would want to use something
like this for is to charge perhaps a laptop or cell phone or not to run any
any you know appliances or anything like that so this is step one I'm just going
to cut all the wires and get this up take it all apart take this off take
this off and then I'm going to look around for what kind of battery want to
use I'll show you what I've got a couple of batteries in here that I think have
plenty of life left in them there's uh there's one heart that's a gel cell
battery that's a Harley you come up drains a motorcycle and these are a
couple more gel cell batteries seal the batteries and I'm going to put a tester
on them and see that one or two yeah that might work it's 26 amp hours
yeah that might work I don't have a look at this and see what this says but one
of the other I'm going to charge these up with my battery charger and then see
you put my tester on them and see if they're good and hold the charge and if
not I'll just get me a you know a $30 lawnmower battery and use that okay this
is the this is the beginning of the video I'm going to take that apart and
put a charger on these two batteries well I've got I've got that apart has a
solar panel there's the wires there's the other parts and I have a smaller
inverter it's just a 300 watt but it's a trip light which trip light is a really
good brand I'm going to try to incorporate a battery and the inverter
inside this I do believe it will work
and it's thin enough and short enough this away so I'm charging the battery up
now let's see
hundred percent
well
I'm gonna let it charge little while longer put it on turtle and 12.7 okay
yeah I'm gonna put it on trickle charger and let it top itself off when it does
I'll hook the battery up to this just to keep it charged and then my huh I forget
that better sometimes I have my ceiling winch over here that I work on lawn
mowers with I forget to keep that battery charged that is an old battery
that's how long I've had it that battery came off my 18-wheeler when I reflects
the batteries I take my battery tester and check them all before I turn them in
and if I have a good one I keep it and that was one of them and that's been
many years now five six seven years yeah a good seven years and I just keep it
charged with it still hangs in there okay let me get back to back to doing
stuff um while I'm waiting on that battery charge I took this little
battery tester apart
and I'm going to screw it right here I've got the holes drilled and I got a
little hole drilled here for the for this rubber grommet where the wires are
going to go through
live things hi well I've got the the solar panel
connection run through there I pulled it on but there's really there's just I
could put the inverter up here like this but then I couldn't access the fuse on
the back so I think what I'm going to do is mash it right here I'm going to
remove this handle I'm going to mount this right here which is good because
that way I can access the on and off switch and all that and drill a hole
back here with a rubber grommet to run these down through here so that's what
I'm doing next is knock these handles off all right I got that mounted you got
the handle off got this mounted down with some strapping got the hole drilled
with a rubber grommet in it and I'm going to run my wire through here when I
get the wire through I'm going to put a fuse in on the hot side and still need
to run a cigarette lighter thing but I broke the one that Rick gave me
I broke the tent tags tags off of it so what I'm going to do is get one that
will fit flush with this and it'll be on the inside and I still need to put some
strap in here so this battery doesn't move but uh we're almost done I'll have
this done today
now I need to cut these bolts off on the inside get my 12 volt socket for here
that's it and then I'm going to work on something for this something you can jam
in the ground you know this mounted to it something real simple like a single a
single pole stake but I want to be able to adjust it to face the Sun and turn it
this way to follow the Sun it's only five Watts and if you keep it aimed
directly at the Sun you know you aim it a few times throughout the day you're
you're going to get more more juice out of it so that I'm not going to do that
right now this I'm going to go ahead and stop what
I'm doing yeah actually I'm going to plug something in just to make sure we
got a I got to be real careful when I close that to that and wires don't get
cut up top up and I want to plug something in there let me find something
to plug in okay this is that LED light that I really like you can bend it name
it where you want I use it over there right there when I'm working on knives
at that vice but let's let's see
yep I like it okay cigarette plug cut them nuts and bolts
off hook that battery up where it's going to be secure and not sorry bounce
around I don't know how I'm going to do that I think I'm just going to put a
strap from here down here and I probably a wingnut
yeah what I'll do is bolt it now I'll put it on the side here where if I put
it on the bottom you know there'll be a bump so I'll put it out the side then
come up with it and put a wing nut on this room with it Chloe wait a minute no
it won't the wound oh oh well I'll cut a little slot on this yeah that's what
I'll do yeah I put the wing nut outside too so I can tighten it down and keep
this from sliding around okay that's next and sometime between now and when
you see this I will have a 12 volt socket up here all right I didn't go get
a new one I did break the tabs off of that on both sides but I did manage to
get a screw in there to hold it and it's it's pretty tight so I got that wire
got these cut I believe
yeah that's going to work and carry it with this one all right I'm fixing to
bring this out in the Sun and hook the solar panel up what I want to make for
the solar panel that's going to be another little project I don't quite
have the materials that I need or do I let me have a look-see well I could use
these I want that's a little heavy but I have an idea yeah I've got what I need I
think I can use that okay yeah that'll be another project but I believe I have
everything I need oh okay yeah I'll see outside I'm going
to bring that outside right now there we go
now I have a little portable source of a little bit electricity you know just
enough to charge the phone or laptop and a way of charging the battery back up
I can run something 12-volt off of it
and all that except the box all those parts okay except for the box and the
trip light inverter came from Rick Arkansas prepper is trying to lighten
his load when he was up here at the campground near me while back and I'm
just now getting around to doing something with it
don't put shade on my solar panel who your big oh you're hot huh alrighty
thanks for watching y'all little project now I'm going to finish up Krista's
knife I got it tempered treated I got it hardening tempered cleaned up now I need
to send it back down to a thousand and buff it out and glue the handles on pin
it tomorrow I shape the heavens see you thanks for watching
right here amongst all this activity Mockingbird is came and built her nest
and had
huh
miles open give me my bugs give me my worms every year