Mount Flexible Solar Panel On Truck Roof

Solar cable glands bridge the gap between the roof and the interior of your van.

Mount flexible solar panel on truck roof.

You need to ensure the bolts are running through something fixed and solid not just the thin plywood and aluminum roof. They look identical so you need to mark which one is hot and which one is ground on part of the cables that is not under the panel because once you stick it on the roof you won t be able to check. Connect the cables to the solar panel. Plus these cells can be made of the same silicon as conventional panels including high efficiency monocrystalline gaining the benefit of economies of scale.

A plywood board of the right dimensions will cost you about about 20 usd. It would be safer to have someone help you to lift the solar panels up and onto the truck camper s roof. Installing the solar panels is done by using unistrut cone connectors 1 4 inch or 3 8 inch to attach to the slotted steel l brackets. Mounting flexible panels to your roof can be done in one of two ways.

A solar panel is held in place with four bolts. By using butyl tape underneath the panel and by using either dicor or eternabond tape to seal the edges on the panel or by using butyl tape and screws in a traditional manner most panels have four to six grommets for mounting to the roof of your camper. While this is less flexible than thin film solar it s well suited for a lot of applications where you want the solar panel to conform to a curved surface such as the roof of an rv. I was by myself and used a rope.

With an adjustable tilt mount you can install solar panels with or without a z bracket. To secure the two 100 watt solar panels to the roof of your vehicle you ll need to first mount the solar panels onto the top of a thin plywood board or sheet of metal. Cover all of the foot that will contact the roof with 3m tape. This means that you ll need to create four holes in the rv s roof which also means a higher risk for leaks.

You can use an inexpensive piece of plywood from your local hardware store for this purpose.