solar lighting for a cabin in the boonies

B

bevolution

< 25 Posts
Hi All-

Was wondering if any of you have any insight on solar lighting options. My family has a cabin in rural Colorado and there is plenty of unobscured sunlight. There will be no possibility of electricity being available for years to come. We would like to have a few lights installed indoors where there would be individual, exterior photo cells for each light bulb. Each photo cell would need to be outside the structure, but the light would need to be inside. IOW, the photo cells would need to be separate from the light. I have found many inexpensive outdoor solar lighting, the kind that you would line a sidewalk with, but the photo cells are not separate from the light source. I would not want one photo cell panel for multiple lights, because each light would be far removed from any other and connecting them to the same photocell panel would be prohibitive. Any suggestions, websites, ideas...would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks
 
I think you are not focussed on the real issue. The one light, one panel stuff is crap. You really need a set of panels and a bank of batteries and a regulator. There is a lot of info out there. Don't mees with the stuff at HomeDepot. They are not your source. There is some extermely low amp hour stuff like flourescent lights and fans and stuff. I looked into the issue for hunting cabins and fishing cabins and it's getting close to being workable. Don't rule out wind unless you are worried about people stealing your windmill.
 
Along the same topic, I just bought a really neat solar lantern that I think is practical and cool. It has solar charging capabilities, can be charged by car or house current, and if you leave it turned on in the house and plugged in, if the electricity goes off, the lantern comes on automatically. It is very bright and will last 7 to 12 hours on a charge depending on whether you have on the high or low setting.

It cost about $50 plus shipping. I am very pleased and it has already proven its worth during recent storms and worked like a champ.

Also, it will be with me if we ever have an emergency evacuation situation and will last indefinately.

Click on solar and go to the bottom of the page.

The Link
 
man...what part of Colorado? My folks live out in the boonies about an hour southwest of Gunnison, but they have electricity. hardly any neighbors, but electricity.
 
Thanks for the replies.

Since this cabin is mostly to escape. We are not interested in spending a whole lot of money. As it is, we have a generator to run the pump on the well and we use propane/gas for everything else. If we were wnating to live there permanently, then we would either seriously go solar (as suggested above) or start talking to neighboring land owners to make a push to get electricity. The idea is to not sink a lot of money into batteries, panels, and the like, at least not a on large scale. All we really want are a few bulbs of light. One in the toilet, one in the cabin (they are separate), and one near the deck. So we are talking about three light bulbs, two of which could run off the same battery/solar panel, the other would be too much hassle, if a "self-contained" apparatus was available, to connect to the other two..

I will look into the sites suggested above.

On another note, the property lies in, from what I can tell from old maps, the part of Texas that was given to the US as part of the condition of being granted statehood. At least its back in the right hands.
 
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