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Sunforce 39810 SHARP Polycrystalline Solar Kit - 80W
 
Manufacturer: Sunforce
Customer Rating:
 
List Price: $699.99
Sale Price: $403.74
Availibility: Usually ships in 24 hours
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Product Description
The Sunforce 39810 80-Watt High-Efficiency Polycrystalline Solar Panel Module will give you several more reasons to love the sun. It provides the power you need, while helping you save money and protect the environment. This panel is ideal for cabins, recreational vehicles, remote power, back-up power, and 12-Volt battery charging. This panel comes with compatible wiring, accessories and a voltage tester to help you start producing up to 80 Watts of clean, free power in all weather conditions.


Sunforce panels can be easily added to new or existing systems.
Convenient Power That Helps You Save Money and Protect the Environment
The Sunforce 39810 80-Watt High-Efficiency Polycrystalline Solar Panel Module lets you harness the power of the sun, the most powerful and plentiful source of energy available to us. This inexhaustible supply of power is freely available wherever the sun shines, and gives users the freedom to power their homes, RVs, boats, batteries, and electronic equipment far from civilization or right in town. Solar power can help cut your energy bills by reducing your dependence on the main electrical grid, and can also provide back-up power during outages. Unlike nuclear and fossil fuels, solar power systems are clean and pollution-free, and they require very little maintenance to operate.


Sunforce Solar Panels are effective in areas of both high and lower
sun exposure, making them ideal for use in the United States.
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Flexible Power for New or Existing Systems
The Sunforce 39810 80-Watt High-Efficiency Polycrystalline Solar Panel Module is an ideal addition to both new and existing solar power systems. It comes with a voltage tester, wiring and mounting accessories to make installation easy. These solar panels can be used individually, or they can be connected together to boost power output.

Sunforce High-Efficiency Polycrystalline Solar Panels must be connected to a compatible charge controller (sold separately). The charge controller prevents the solar panel from overcharging and damaging connected batteries or electrical systems. It also prevents reverse current from sapping your battery strength at night. Sunforce High-Efficiency Polycrystalline Solar Panels can be connected in parallel for 12-Volt systems, or in series for 24- and 32-Volt applications. Please ensure that the components being used in your system are compatible with the individual and total output voltage of your solar panels.

About Polycrystalline Solar Power
Polycrystalline silicon is a material consisting of thin wafers that are cut from a silicon crystal which has grown in several directions. This advanced surface texturing process provides polycrystalline solar panels with a higher power output than amorphous panels of the same dimensions, and makes them more cost and space-effective. These individual wafers are assembled into panels that are covered by durable, weatherproof tempered glass. Thanks to their efficiency and durability, these solar panels require virtually no maintenance once installed. This solar panel has a maximum power output of 80-Watts/4.67-Amps.

Solar panels convert sunlight into an electric current; they do not actually store power. Sunforce Solar Power Panels are primarily used to recharge all types of 12-Volt batteries, including lead-acid automotive batteries, deep-cycle (traction type) batteries, gel-cell batteries, and heavy-duty (stationary type) batteries. When using these solar panels to run appliances on a regular basis, the use of deep-cycle marine batteries is recommended. This type of battery is designed to withstand the frequent charge and discharge cycles associated with solar panel use.

Product Details
  • Advanced polycrystalline design is highly efficient and provides superior power output
  • Maximum power output: 80 Watts/4.67 Amps
  • Multiple panels can be connected together for even more power
  • Easy to install and virtually maintenance-free
  • 25-year warranty

Video Reviews
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Customer Reviews
AWESOME
 
Review Date: August 17, 2010
Reviewer: HarleyMike,
This is a great Solar Panel, does everything as promised and is of the highest quality. Highly recommend.
high quality panels for the money
 
Review Date: July 31, 2010
Reviewer: ChrisOlson,
I installed ten of these panels to supplement my three wind turbines, charging a 5,000 amp-hour battery bank, and they perform as advertised. I've seen the array deliver up to 72 amps @ 14.5 volts with the sun shining directly on them. On a dark, overcast day each panel puts out about 14-20 watts. The price per watt-hour is considerably higher than wind power, but the fact that they make power every day makes them a nice supplement to an existing wind power system.
Works great
 
Review Date: July 23, 2010
Reviewer: Ken Buckley, WASHINGTON, DC, US
I am not an engineer - but I bought this inverter with a Sharp 80W solar panel and a Sunforce charge controller to provide lights in a barn. The power company wanted to charge me $200 to connect power, $25 a month connection fee, and usage It took about a 1/2 day to set things up. Of course the hardest part was installing the solar panel. Once that was done, it was very easy to connect the panel to the charge controller and to the battery. I bought a Sears Marine Battery that is charged by the panel and I run the Cobra inverter off of the battery. I run shop lights and CFC (11W) bulbs for light, radio, and low watt fan. Its great and should pay back in a year. If you have a very low power use application - then this will work.
Incomplete panel..
 
Review Date: July 16, 2010
Reviewer: Fud,
I have other sunforce 80 watt panels and they all perform wonderfully well. My issue with this panel was half the hardware was missing. Normally the plastic bags holding the parts are sealed, but these were opened. I improvised the mounts and made it work anyway - just something to be careful of in your shipments.
errors
 
Review Date: June 24, 2010
Reviewer: Nick, rolling stone
There are quite a few errors in the listing for this solar panel - the dimensions listed are for the shipping size - the actual panel size is 21 X 48 x 2 inches. The listing also says it is suitable for RV and marine use - but the warranty that comes with it states that the warranty is void if used in a mobile or marine enviornment.

The panel itself is very efficient - putting out upwards of 6 amps under good conditions. But my impression is that it is meant only for roof mounting, and is far too fragile to be bouncing around on top of an RV or camper, or mounted on the deck of a boat. The back is protected only by a plastic sheet, and the bottom edge of the aluminum frame is less than 1/8 inch thick - fine for roof mounting only.

The mounting hardware that came with my sample bears no relation the that pictured in the instructions (however the picture in the listing is accurate); and there were no battery clamps or quick connects.
Great panel for small scale 12 volt systems
 
Review Date: April 24, 2010
Reviewer: fred brooks, fairview, or United States
This is a very high quality panel by sharp. Provides good power even in the Northwest overcast days. I plan to buy more.
Great Panel - packed poorly
 
Review Date: February 27, 2010
Reviewer: R. Rothen,
The panel is great - built very solid, as well.
One thing I did not care for: it was packed poorly. An extra layer of heavy cardboard on the outside of the box would be good. The mounting- kit, cable and free tester were just floating in the box. I bought two panels (2 separate orders) - both times it was shipped in the same manner.
The panels would deserve 5 stars... but because of poor packing... only 3 stars.
Sunforce does the Job
 
Review Date: February 7, 2010
Reviewer: John E. Miles, LAURINBURG, NC, US
I've purchased the Sunforce 39810 80-watt solar panel, and completed the easy installation. I also purchased the 30 Amp controller. Both units are working as advertised. The panel provides approx 4.7 amperes on a sunny day to recharge my battery.
An excellent bargain for either battery usage or grid tie - great size too
 
Review Date: February 5, 2010
Reviewer: HMMWV, santa clara, CA USA
QUICK UPDATE: Sunforce is selling obsolete Sharp 12% efficient panels no longer in production at 123W/panel, 2 panels to a kit with a junky inverter and charge controller.. See my review at Sunforce 39126 246-Watt High-Efficiency Polycrystalline Solar Power Kit but choose cautiosly as that product is from 2008 and is now obsolete which makes expansion of your system difficult due to the efficiency change.

---back to the review as it stood originally---

In evaluating solar panels (and systems of many panels) the typical pricepoint is $5.10/watt in high volume production. If you are finding better pricing than that something is wrong.

An example may be inefficient panels that use larger panels, causing massive panel size such that it is 4-8 times larger than this panel with the same output.

Other inefficiencies to watch out for are caused by voltages that are not useful. You could, for example, have a panel that output 500V at 1/10 A for 50W sold for $250 - looks good financially but very few charge controllers go much over 250 volts (and many dont make 250 volts - some are 12 or 48 volt systems). So that panel is not much use

This panel is in the sweet spot - enough power to be useful (80W/3 is a simple approximation for what useful power you can get with a battery all day long - about 25W or so given inefficiences. So theoretically it could support a 25W load 24x7 with an 8 hour day of sun.

The last inefficiencies to watch out for are panels that need heavy sun before they produce any output. Some panels produce usable (1-2 amps) output with just ambient scattered light such as a foggy day, while others give near zero output unless the sunlight strikes them head on. This panel design gives output whenever there is light, which is good. More light is always better, but it could be worse.

So to sum it up - there are no pitfalls here. It passes all the checks for pricing and performance. We load tested a string of 12 of these for a customer to profile their output to help decide if a rotator would help and it showed that very little gain would come from the expense of an automatic rotation system due to the panel's efficiency at many angles. With 12 panels we produced 1KW for 8 hours with taper up and down on both sides.

Best of all this can be used in series strings for grid tie systems or with battery maintainers
Off grid power
 
Review Date: October 5, 2009
Reviewer: Wayne Shappy,
This product works great it provides me with enough power to keep in touch with the outside world.

Filed under: Solar Panels

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