Wind Generator and Solar Panels on Valentina

We installed a KISS Wind Generator and two Siemens 75 watt solar panels on our arch davits before we left the US in 2005. We have been very pleased and impressed with both of these.

The solar panels will generate 10 amps of power on a sunny day. The solar panel controller will let us know exactly how much they are producing and cut off when the batteries are charged.

The wind generator will add around 20 amps or more, depending on the wind speed. We have been impressed how quiet the generator actually is. You can sometimes hear it whirl, but it is not an annoying sound. When the batteries are fully charged, the controller for the wind generator sends the power to the hot water heater, as a diversion load. However, we have to have 10 knots of wind before generating any power.

As of March, 2009, we have added four Kyrocera 130's on top of our new hard bimini we had made in Cartagena. Colombia.

We also invested in a Power Systems MX60 controller for our solar panels. Most days we get between 175 - 200 amp hours from our solar panels. Our highest day has been 234 amp hours in one day.

This system is working well for us. We can stay on anchor, which we do, for weeks without charging our batteries. We run our watermaker (PUR C-80) every other day, our laptop most of the day, even make ice in our icemaker occasionally.

We do start our Panda generator and engine periodically, as to not neglect them.


	We designed our hard bimini so we could get four solar panels on it. We also added a one inch lip, made of the same fiberglass, around the outer edge of our bimini to catch rainwater. Sonny installed drains and a hose we can hook up from the bimini to our water tank opener. When it rains, our 100 gallon tank fills up very quickly. For live-aboard cruisers, we believe solar panels are the way to go. No maintenance, no diesel, no noise. They just keep working and working. We like staying out in the islands for months at a time, and the solar panel and battery set-up we currently have, enable us to do so without running anything to charge our batteries. As you can tell, we just cannot say enough about our solar panels. It was expensive, we thought, in Panama purchasing our 130's for $750 each, but the repay adds up quickly. And the solitude on anchorage is worth a lot. For example, for the last two days, a boat anchored near us ran his engine for probably 4 hours yesterday and is running it again right now. Every time we hear an engine running, we breathe a thankful sigh of relief. Every boat has different systems.....but this is working well for us on Valentina.