36 volt PV regulator

[Joe Blake]

A few weeks ago, I was at a local "sustainability group" meeting, and was talking to a lady who has an electric bicycle (36 volt motor), and she was interested in my own take on electric transport and the fact that my tricycle carries its own photovoltaic panels to recharge the (24 volt) batteries, wishing to fit her own machine with same.

Whilst it's easy enough to find some PVs to generate the requisite voltage, it's been far more difficult to find a small, inexpensive, low power (>40 watts) 36 volt regulator that would be suitable for this purpose.

I did find an article on the 'net wherein an experimenter described how he rewired a Solarex SC-18 regulator to work on 36 volts, but I can't find these for sale anywhere (although there was an advert at one stage offering several for a small price per each.)

Whilst I'd be happy to attempt the modifications described as above, I'd rather get a proper 36 volt reg. The only ones I've been able to track down are either pretty expensive, pretty large, or need to be purchased in lots of 50.:amazed:

Would anybody have any ideas please?

Thanks.

Joe

[Rob Beckers]

Joe, what does the bike use now to recharge? I'm assuming this came with a charger of some sort, can this handle 12V by any chance? What is the battery technology? Lead-acid would be easy, but lithium-ion needs very careful charge management.

-RoB-

[Joe Blake]

Rob,

I haven't actually seen the bike, but she tells me it has a charger. Lead acid batteries on these sorts of machines are becoming a little archaic (she tells me it's a Chinese brand) so I'll assume it has something "fancy" that'll require kid gloves. :laugh:

We were talking briefly on the telephone yesterday and she says she'll get in contact with me again soon, so I'll hopefully find out a little more.

Joe

[Joe Blake]

I received an email from the lady yesterday with some more details. Although I've not seen the bike in question, I've found it on the internet, and it seems to have NiMH batteries, and is 24 volts. This is good news, since I can make an "on-board" PV array which won't be physically too big and become a traffic hazard.

http://urbanmover.com/images/products/bikes/UM26-7.jpg

However, there still remains the question of regulating the power from the PVs. I can easily obtain a 24 volt regulator,

http://www.12volt.com.au/General%20Htmls/webcat2003/RPR1210L.gif
http://www.12volt.com.au/General%20Htmls/webcat2003/catalogue%20work%20in%20progrPC21.JPG

but these are designed for lead-acid batteries and so would cut-out at about 30 volts. I've absolutely no experience with NiMH charging, so the question that raises in my mind is whether this regulator would be suitable for this purpose.

Joe

[Cor van Houtum]

Hello Joe,

Nice Lady !!!

Maybe this will work
I have good expierence with this unit

Kind regards

Cor

[Joe Blake]

Dank u, Cor.

I think I've already found a solution as of this morning, but I'll keep yours in mind, and update here on any success (or otherwise).

The lady in the photo is not the lady concerned, but she's nice looking too. :blink1:

Joe