DIY Solar Bimini Top for Kayak - Increase Range by Charging Your Battery on the Water

[@stefanlangheden]

Great video, I'm going on a 6 day trip with the kayak next year in Sweden, so I have order a solar panel to extend my batteries 😊

[@MoeBergOSS]

After watching your videos and a few others I’m going to use a 100ah lithium battery with a Pac-Motor to do the entire 800+ miles of the Brazos River in Texas. I have an inflatable kayak so I’ll be paddling as well. Using the pac motor at about 2.5 mph I could get about 10-15 miles per day just with the pac motor.

[@allkindsofoutdooractivities]

I enjoyed your journey. Hope you can make the whole trek next year!

[@cn5776]

Great job! I did a similar project with my 12 T Asend, but purchased a bimini top from amozon for about a $100 showed it was for a canoe - had to cut a few inches out to make the correct width but was pretty easy and looked good when done - just pointing out theres a lazy guys aproach. like your lower front stap approch -will be modifiying mine THANKS!!!

[@kwikflikzyakadventures3795]

Great video, I do Kayak camping 3-5day trips, I used to use a 5hp Yamaha on My Hobie PA14, but my kids brought me a 44lb Watersnake trolling motor for Father’s Day 2021, I built a 60amp PWM and it works great and has extended my range, I would love to add a solar panel and charge controller to my 120amp AGM, I’m planning a 3 day trip in 2 weeks, You have made a great video and clearly explained, I also use the tides, so I launch at the top of the tide and get 2-3klms run out tide assistance to camp spot and then return on the incoming tide, Cheers from Aussie.

[@mlm32809]

Your video gave me some ideas as far s as a way to get some type of motorboat into the water along the ICW.

[@LJ-jq8og]

LOVE your channel and your work ❗ AWESOME and thank you ❗❗🙏

[@ke2delight]

So if you put 4 panels you’d charge enough to go even overnight… you’d be charging more than you use. So you could go even faster. That’s amazing!!! 😮

[@vinmat3558]

Nice job. Thinking and rethinking benefits the rest of us.

[@MilesDeep]

Wow, this is so cool! Fantastic work, and thanks for sharing!

[@bonilla2022]

GREAT VIDEO! Always interested in electric power and solar.

[@tybla2222]

Very helpful , I have a shade canopy for my kayak and you cannot use it at all if it’s windy . I’m looking into a solar panel to keep my trolling motor going and I might try a solar panel to sit on top of the shade canopy and it might not blow around as much and strong enough to support the solar panel. Planning a week long camping and kayak trip on the river

[@jjhbhd520]

Good project but would be more helpful using Wh or Ah rather than W. A Watt is a joule per second, so the 250W motor would use 0.250kWh in an hour, for example.

[@clearnewview]

I am planning to get a Sea Eagle 385fta pro angler kayak. I think this is pretty nice set up you built. The Sun Power panel seems much cheaper than the panel Sea Eagle offers from Power Film. I was thinking of using shock corded style tent poles for a frame work which would probably be lighter and smaller when stowed. Maybe I will not even do the solar power panel and just use mylar space blanket material for shade on light weight tent pole frame from front to back. I am surprised that after all the searching I have done, I have not seen any frame made from shock corded tent poles.

[@FRECUENSIAX]

excellent job 💪😎 i want to make one for myself here in the caribbean. greetings from Puerto Rico!

[@LJ-jq8og]

I was just thinking EXACTLY the same !!!! Lower Bahamas for me...😎

[@infomax2008]

Thank you very much. Great thing to do the loop

[@KayakhacksFishing]

What a cool idea! Thanks for the product links!

[@NiteWolfeFishing]

Ok, question the numbers you put out.. was that with 1 panel or the 3 panels you showed at the start of the video?

[@danielbuckman2727]

Nice work, I'm building a tandem solar kayak. I'm almost finished with it. It has 55 lb thrust motor, dual 18 volt Ryobi batteries parallel, 4 100 watt solar panels no charge controller. The batteries are just going to be used as backup I plan on running mostly on solar. The solar panels will not recharge the batteries. The nominal charge in the batteries is actually about 20 volts. And the panels can reach 19.5.

[@MastaSquidge]

How did it work out? Panels might have 19.5voc but that doesn't mean they are at that voltage under load. Did you end up running the panels in series with a charge controller?

[@mlm32809]

Get a Jackery, it can charge your Ryobi batteries and is able to recharge via AC/DC power port/solar.

[@MastaSquidge]

@@mlm32809 overpriced. You can cut the cost in half building your own battery.

[@danielbuckman2727]

Thanks for the replies guys, I actually finished that kayak. It is awesome. you get full shade and propulsion. Currently working on another kayak with a motor unlike any other.

[@danielbuckman2727]

@@MastaSquidge nope I ran in parallel. It typically cruises around 3 miles an hour on the panels. Some cases you can get up to 5 and going against winding current you can go down to about 2. On the batteries it's a steady 6 miles an hour. I use a selector switch to choose between batteries and solar panels.

[@davescheer5038]

I was just kinda wondering why you just didn’t build the frame work out of pvc pipe and maybe X brace it behind the seat to keep it from side swaying , I’d like to power a canoe on solar and of course on the cheap all ready got a minncota saltwater 55 but still trying to figure the best way to go with panels and battery and controller, and cost .

[@joshtheplow]

GENIUS 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻

[@bonilla2022]

Talk a little bit about regristration of your kayak with the motor. I imagine that all states are different , Fl. here.

[@dr.froghopper6711]

Does it act like a sail in the wind? NM has some nasty wind on occasion and I’d hate to get stuck on shore on the back side of a lake, unable to make headway in the wind or blowing over sideways. I really don’t want to put out the money to dump it in a lake.

[@eugsmiley]

Easy solution for your high wind situation: Make it so that you can disassemble the overhead solar mount while you are seated in the kayak. You will still have the battery and motor to be able to troll back to dock. Also, note that he has three solar panels installed, one overhead and two behind the seat. If you are concerned about the wind you could simply do without the bimini and rear mount all your panels.

[@kcthomas786]

Where did u get the Bimini top from?

[@aftech7268]

Nice -

[@buns52557]

You know l did a solar set up on my kayak l spent a lot money on my set up charger control solar panel it gust wasn’t worth it. I like the idea but the solar panel l was using was only 50 W and when l checked the wattage on it only put out about 25 watts. China crab

[@davescheer5038]

Was thinking on doing solar on a canoe , but undecided on what to get and been checking out vids to see what other people have done , you did it already why isn’t it worth it ? won’t it keep up with your motor use ? Charge back the battery fast enough?

[@RGCbaseace]

If i could i would cover every sq inch of my sv

[@mr.e7022]

how come my comments disappear?