A common misconception that people go through is you need sunlight to charge the solar lights. But to your convenience, you can also charge the solar lights in other ways. But as we are not well informed about those, we fail to implement the easy ways and bother ourselves with the belief that we cannot charge the solar lights on a gloomy day.
We are here to save your future on this today. Keep on reading and you will know How to charge solar lights without the sun in detail. In short, you can use artificial lights to charge the solar lights without the help of direct sunlight. Any simple household bulb will help you in this regard as well.
That’s not enough for you, we get it. Dive into the main context and know more in detail!
How to charge solar lights without the sun?
There’s a common thought process that people will need sunlight for charging the solar lights. But if that theory would be correct then there should be a huge problem in cloudy rainy days or winter seasons.
To let you know the truth, one can surely charge the lights during those seasons without much trouble. Because there are other options of charging such as using artificial lighting bulbs. One can easily charge their solar lights with the assist of a synthetic bulb.
The light that comes out from a bulb is the main source of charging the solar lights. The emitting light is going to help the solar lights to consume the energy from it and turn it into solar power. In this case, you should place the solar light beneath the synthetic lightning bulb or simply a household bulb. This will cause the solar lights to charge rapidly.
If you can not put the solar light right underneath the incandescent build, you can place the solar lights close to the light bulb. The nearer you keep it, the sooner it will charge itself. But if the solar lights are away from the lightning bulbs, it will take a longer time to charge.
Again you can also surely use a LED light to fulfill the demand of charging a solar light. Led lights are used as a substitute for a household bulb. But this process takes an extended time than usual.
The normal solar light takes about 6 hours to charge from direct sunlight. But in this case, it takes approximately ten to twelve hours to fulfill the charge capacity of a regular used solar light. You have to maintain the distance rule here in the same way as well. The closer the merrier.
Nevertheless, the efficiency of charging them by artificial or led lights is still low compared to original sunlight. And if someone has wind solar-powered lights then when there is no or a little sunray the lights can alternatively use wind power to charge during severe emergencies.
Although solar lights are made to optimize energy rein during the day that surely doesn’t mean that they won’t work when there is no sun. It can store the power inside the batteries so that it can be used afterward. Thus it can be said that solar lights can be charged without any solar energy by various methods.
Read next: How To Use Solar Panel Directly Without Battery
Do solar cells need direct sunlight?
Solar panels don’t need direct sunlight to produce energy. But yes the optimum performance of a solar panel is achieved in broad daylight. As it is known that, the sunlight emits photons that contain energy packets.
Photon magazine included in the solar panel consumes it and thus it generates energy that is needed to charge the solar panel. It is considered good if a solar panel gets enough sunlight. So broad sunshine is greatly appreciated to charge the panels. On days when The sun can not be found the solar cells still can generate a charge. So to charge a solar cell it doesn’t have to be placed directly under sunlight.
How many hours of the sun do solar panels need?
The sunlight totally relies on nature. When someone is setting up a solar panel for the first time they need at least 4 hours of peak sunlight. Typical 4 hours of sunlight that is at its peak is the best option for a solar panel to work properly. Solar panels that have strong batteries and more storage power need more than four hours of sunlight.
Sometimes it can extend to twelve hours. Although it totally depends on the capacity and the quality of the battery. But to be more specific, exactly 5.67 hours of peak sunlight is more than enough to go through all night. Most of the solar panel contains energy conservation- photovoltaic power which is a typical one. So an average of 5.67 hours of sunlight can keep it going all night. As a peak sun hour gives 1000 watts of photovoltaic power per square meter so 4 hours of sunlight should be enough.
Frequently asked questions
Can you charge a solar light with a flashlight?
Yes, one can charge a solar light by using flashlights or led lights. It is one of the best alternative ways when someone has no access to the lights that are used in the household. But the wavelength of sunlight and led lights are not equal so it takes a good amount of time to charge the solar lights using led flashlights.
Can solar panels charge on cloudy days?
Solar panels do work in cloudy weather. But the performance of a solar panel is doubtful when the weather is dull or cloudy. It can only produce ten to fifteen percent of its energy to elicit the charge and then be stored in the batteries. So on cloudy days, solar panels can work but it will take more time to charge and they will have to use their storage power.
Do solar panels work with Moonlight?
Solar panels don’t work with moonlight. There is a difference between sunlight and moonlight. The sunlight emits photons that contain energy packets. But moonlight has no photons of its own so it can not produce any energy and thus is unable to generate a solar panel. That’s why solar panels don’t work with moonlight.
Can fire charge a solar panel?
Fire can not directly charge solar panels. But the light that fire creates can somewhat charge the solar panels. As solar panels contain photon magazines so it shows extremely slow fire hazards As there is a low possibility of catching fire one can try to charge it by fire lights. However direct fire cannot charge solar panels.
How do you charge solar lights for the first time?
To charge solar panels for the first time one has to set up on a rooftop where the sunlight can come directly. Then the panels should be left open for charging. If someone is using it for the first time they should confirm charging it for 8 hours at least. As it’s an automated system so there is no specific process of charging it.
Closing words
Hopefully, everything that we have shared on How to charge solar lights without sun has been helpful to you. Now you know that there are a couple of ways of charging your solar lights without the sun. So, you don’t need to worry about a gloomy day or rainy season, you can always charge your lights.
But remember, the efficiency will be lower than the sunlight as it is an artificial source of energy that you will be using. But yet, it’s better than nothing. In this case, as we stated above, make sure that you are putting the solar lights as close as possible to the source of the energy. Otherwise, it will take a hell of a time to complete the charging.