TODAY I LEARNED

Solar is a power Generator

We often think of Solar as a convenience for charging our batteries, but we should think of them in the same way we do for a running generator.

Recently I needed to disconnect my main battery bank in the boat for some maintenance. During this I managed to not only run the full boat 12V systems normally, like fridges, water pumps etc. but also my inverter and 240V systems.

This was a real bonus and meant I was not time constrained with my maintenance, as long as I completed whilst there was still sunshine!!

But explaining this to other boaters many could not get their head around the fact that the battery was completely disconnected and yet there was still full voltage in the boat.

It dawned on me that this is a serious accident waiting to happen. Disconnect batteries to work on a system, expecting it to be safe and discover the hard way it is NOT.

Solar, GenSet, Batteries or latent Inverter supply (Inverters keep power for a while after turned off) all need to be treated carefully as POWER SOURCES and you should never expect a power system to be safe until you have tested to be safe.

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