Can you solar charge an EV with this unit? No. Here’s why.
Can you charge an electric car using the power of the sun? And why aren’t all cars covered in solar panels? Hoping to do some explaining in this very video. First of all, let’s see where we’re going to start. And then after an hour, I’m going to see where we are. So, I haven’t turned the solar generator on yet, but uh we’re at 84 miles 43%. And the time is 10:24 a.m. So, I’m going to turn it off, turn it on, and uh you can come with me. I’m going to do this really quick and come around here and just press the AC button. This video is actually not sponsored by Jackaryi. Uh, but they provided this unit and we’ve been using it uh for some paid content in earlier videos, but uh I knew a lot of people knew knew I had this and a lot of people were like, “Well, why didn’t you take this on the road trip? It could have been really helpful.” So, um, there we go. Uh, we are charging. It’s just gone cloudy. 50 watts of energy coming in through the solar panel. But look, we got 1,328 watts um going out currently at 60%. Let’s see where we are in an hour. Uh that’s that’s incidentally that’s about half the capacity it’s drawing um uh in what hours. So uh yeah, it’s got about an hour of charge in it. So uh we’ll see what it does. So, after just 20 minutes, uh, this has dropped from 60% down to 45. So, the panel not helped by the cloud. We got a lot of cloud going on today. We haven’t got the direct sunshine. It’s it’s not helping. But remember, we’re drawing 1,300 watts. And when the sun shines, the maximum we’re going to get is 200 watts. And, uh, it’s more like it’s been pulling a genuinely impressive 186. You know, we’re in September. It’s already not summer. Uh, but we’re still pulling about 186 watts when um the sun is shining strongly. But that 186 watts in against 1,300 watts out is probably why you don’t see electric cars covered in solar panels. You would need a huge solar panel to put a meaningful amount of power into your electric car. Here’s a further hint that this isn’t going to go well. Look at the remaining time to charge up. I’ve got it set to a 90% limit on charging at the moment. Although that might be ignored for this because it’s not DC, but it’s going to take 28 hours to charge it up at the current rate. Uh we haven’t got enough power in the little box to um deliver 28 hours of electricity. Okay, we’re 35 minutes in and the jacker is already down to 15%. We are pushing the little unit hard. not really what it’s meant for. The sun is shining again, but uh it’s just not enough. It’s a fraction of what’s coming out is going back in. So, uh it just doesn’t even work. Even with a solar panel of a good size like this, I mean, you know, you imagine a couple of them on the roof, you’re still only going to get 400 W absolute maximum. And granted, it could put some juice in the car while you’re just sitting there, but uh this car, like many, won’t charge and um drive at the same time. So, you’ve got to do one or the other. But, uh, let’s see what difference it’s actually made. I’m going to turn it off now. Uh, turn off the AC. So, it’s stopped charging. How many miles do you think it’s put on? So, we were at 43% and 83 miles of range. Uh, what has 35 minutes of 13 amp charging done? Um, not very much. We’ve gained an entire 3 miles of range in 35 minutes. So, uh, it’s flashing that cuz the hatchback’s open. So, yeah, it just doesn’t really work. Also note, it isn’t just, um, the little charge box here. Uh, if you’re plugged into a 13 amp plug, it is not going to put much range in your car at all. You really need to look to get a home charger installed if you can, or you’re just life on the road. Uh, the type two, the lower rating, it’s about 7 kW. Um, we’ll charge one of these up in probably about 8 hours, but uh, it’s also kinder to the battery. Uh, regular rapid charging, not very good for the batteries. So they say, I mean, there there’s, you know, Hyundai’s in Paris uses taxis by getting rapid charged all the time and still showing very good battery health uh, even after several years. So, we’re still we’re finding out. This is science. We’re still finding out what works and what doesn’t. But I can categorically say that uh a little charge box like this and a solar panel is not enough to charge your electric car. We can do the sums here and work out how many miles this would potentially give us. If it was at 100% before we started, uh it could put out about 3,000 watts or 3 kW. Uh so if we work out we can probably get on average 4.2 2 miles per kilowatt hour. Then we know it has the potential to give us a whopping 12.6 miles, which if you were at the end of your teor would be better than nothing at all if you were absolutely out of electricity, but it would take quite a long time to put that electricity into the car. So, uh it’s not it’s not like having a can of fuel in the back. Uh really, you just need to keep an eye on your mileage and make sure you get to a charger, which these days is easier than ever.
Can a solar generator be used like a can of petrol to keep your EV going? No, and it all boils down to the sums.
Tested on a Hyundai Inster using a Jackery solar generator that was supplied for some earlier paid-for content.
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