5000w solar LED street light

An interesting light, but also a prime example of how eBay sellers are very prone to out of control exaggeration to sell their wares.

The circuitry in this mass produced item has been "optimised" to the hilt, with the charging of the lithium cell controlled by the microcontroller, no voltage regulation and no resistor in series with the LEDs which results in quite a squirmy current when tested on a bench supply.

The LED current at various cell voltages was:-
4V = 2A
3.4V = 1A
3V = 600mA
2.5V = 11mA

The lithium cell capacity yielded a slightly lacklustre 1200mAh on the first cycle. I may run some more cycles on it.

There are a few hacks that can be done to this light. First one is to add a 1 ohm (2W) resistor (or higher) to cap the LED current to a sensible level. That will also give longer run time on a charge.
The easiest hack is to swap the lithium cell for a higher capacity one, but note that the solar panel is probably only rated about 100mA on a good day. So the larger cell will only have an advantage in PIR only mode and with just occasional triggering.

From a waterproofing perspective, the PCB would benefit from a coating of lacquer or grease to shield it from condensation, the battery contacts would also benefit from some grease and the on/off slide switch is best bypassed.
The shape and angle of the case means that it should be fairly resilient to rain.

The solar panel is laid into a recess in the plastic case and covered in resin. Extremes of temperature may cause delamination or cracking of the silicon strips. It will probably discolour and cloud quite quickly, but that can be improved by polishing it with a fine abrasive cream like T-cut or toothpaste.


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