http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=220818836324&ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1439.l2649#ht_1852wt_972 This should be the correct relay link...

I'm not sure what the load is from the motor...I can't find any specs. Another person mentioned the motors draw 2 to 3 amps.

contact capacity on that is 10A. I'm thinking there had to have been a wiring fail that connected the + straight up to the -.
you sure the coil of that relay is 24V? on the ebay page it says the contacts are rated for 10A @ 24V, but everything i see on that page says 12V coil.

 

There must have been a short in the other DPDT...I picked up one from Radio Shack, rewired the whole rig and everything is working perfectly...Now I'm going to try and fit it to the coop....Thanks for all the help...I hope I haven't been to much of a PAIN....It turned out to be a pretty big project, now I understand why you said to take it one step at a time! I will post pictures when it is all done...Thanks

 

SWEETNESS. Glad to hear it. looking forward to seeing it in action,

 

I finally got it mostly installed...Looking good if I do say so myself...I had one electrical problem...It seems that when the motor has a load on it, the solar power regulator blows it's 4amp fuse. To fix the problem I've bypassed the regulator and wired the wiring harness straight to the battery. It's working great now. The only benefit to having it wired to the regulator is that the regulator will kill power if the battery gets to low. So I'm thinking this is a better solution anyways, because I want the motor to work no matter what....Or should I be more concerned? I plan to wire any thing else through the regulator of course.

Thanks for all the help! I couldn't have done it with out help!

 

I will post photos soon...

 

not sure what you mean by regulator. can you post a link to it?

 

I meant The solar panel charge controller!

 

I meant The solar panel charge controller!

Ok, that makes a little more sense. My first thought is that the motor (or anything else) shouldn't be connected to the charge controller, other than by the fact that the charge controller is in parallel with the battery (I would think). If the charge controller is in parallel with the battery and still blowing the fuse, you could put a 4Ω resistor between the charge controller and the battery, that would limit current drawn from the controller to 3A, and still permit full juice to flow from the battery to the motor.

 

So I have the fuse issue under control. Now my issue is keeping the battery charged. I'm not sure why it is depleting so quickly. I wired led lights to the limit switches open position, to let me know if the door is open or closed. I can't imagine these using to much power, but in one day time the battery is dead. The door only opens once and closes once in this period of time. I hope some of the issues will be resolved when I build my permanent structure for my solar panels. Now I only get about 30% of the sun. I am having to trickle charge my battery every other day or so with my current set up.

I want to wire a back up power option. I would like to use 120v as my back up. I figure I could wire another DPDT relay. With the solar panel charge controller hooked up to the coil. Power option one being the battery, and option two being the 120v ran through a transformer of some sort. The Solar controller has a 12v output that shuts down when the battery gets low. This should control the coil pretty good. My only problem is finding a 12v 10a wall wart. to make the transfer from 120v to 12v. Any ideas or am I going in the wrong direction. Thanks

 

how much amperage does this thing (the whole setup) draw during the day? do you have a meter to test it? My guess is that it should be in the milliamps range (<100mA?) ; after all the only thing drawing stead state power is your LED, a timer, and a relay(?don't remember about the relay). If that's correct, I would suspect that your solar setup is not charging your battery for some reason and/or possibly your battery is bad (where did you get the battery?)

 

I bought the battery new from autozone. I got the cheapest, no maintenance marine battery they had, kinda wishing I spent the more money now. http://http://shop.advanceautoparts.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/product_12-Volt-Marine-RV-Starting-Maintenance-Free-Battery-Autocraft-Marine_2080001-P_N3583_A%7CGRP60054_____
I don't think I have a meter I will have to check. I know I need to get better sun exposure.

Do you have any suggestions on the alternative power set up. What transformer to get and where to find the best price. What do you think about using the DPDT relay as my switch, and am I thinking of the correct configuration. Thanks for sticking in here with me!

 

http://shop.advanceautoparts.com/we...ocraft-Marine_2080001-P_N3583_A|GRP60054_____

I couldn't get the link to work so I figure I should just paste it.

 

I bought the battery new from autozone. I got the cheapest, no maintenance marine battery they had, kinda wishing I spent the more money now. http://http://shop.advanceautoparts.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/product_12-Volt-Marine-RV-Starting-Maintenance-Free-Battery-Autocraft-Marine_2080001-P_N3583_A%7CGRP60054_____
I don't think I have a meter I will have to check. I know I need to get better sun exposure.

You really should be using a deep cycle battery:

Starting (sometimes called SLI, for starting, lighting, ignition) batteries are commonly used to start and run engines. Engine starters need a very large starting current for a very short time. Starting batteries have a large number of thin plates for maximum surface area. The plates are composed of a Lead "sponge", similar in appearance to a very fine foam sponge. This gives a very large surface area, but if deep cycled, this sponge will quickly be consumed and fall to the bottom of the cells. Automotive batteries will generally fail after 30-150 deep cycles if deep cycled, while they may last for thousands of cycles in normal starting use (2-5% discharge)

Do you have any suggestions on the alternative power set up. What transformer to get and where to find the best price. What do you think about using the DPDT relay as my switch, and am I thinking of the correct configuration. Thanks for sticking in here with me!

I'm slightly confused about what you're asking. I'm not even sure how you've got your battery & controller wired up to interface to the rest of the system. I think you have a problem in your wiring. looking at your battery specs, you have a 95min reserve time.

Reserve capacity is the number of minutes a battery can maintain a useful voltage under a 25 ampere discharge. The higher the minute rating, the greater the battery's ability to run lights, pumps, inverters, and electronics for a longer period before recharging is necessary. The 25 Amp

So if your battery is is fully discharging over a span of 12 hours then that means you have a steady draw of 3.3A. The fact that it discharges at this rate even with the solar charger connected means that it is probably discharging even more than 3.3A. that is, unless you have your battery leads swapped and your battery is fighting your solar panel, that could explain it.

but then there was something I remember saying about a 4Ω resistor to limit current to 3A; if you did that and you also have a short then that could account for the 3A. I don't know, check your wiring

 

I didn't add the resistor, instead I by passed the solar panel controller to power the motor and lights. I thought I bought the deep cycle battery but in all my running and changing plans I must have messed that one up. I will get a new battery soon. I want have an alternative power source, just in case the solar system fails. I think I'd like to use the power from my house converted over to 12v as a back up. I was thinking I could use the solar panel controller in conjunction with a DPDT relay to control what power source is used. They solar panel controller shuts off when the battery is below 10v. Typically when the battery isn't working the controller is powered down from lack of power. They have this set up so the controller will give the batter a chance to catch up. During this down time I'd like to use a DPDT relay to switch the power source to my house power. I know I need to convert the 120v to 12v with 10 amps. Do you have any suggestions on the best and cheapest way to do this.

I plan to control the coil on the new DPDT relay with the solar controller. When the controller shuts down it will flip the power option from the battery to the converted house power. This way if I'm out of town my chickens want be stuck out in the cold. I believe I have everything else wired correctly. I have the battery and controller wired correctly. Pos with pos and neg with neg. Thanks for the help!

 

it may last two days.. sometimes it seems to last longer than others.

 

Ok, sure a DPDT relay would do the trick, make sure it's rated for 10A though, and use a fuse. You're not going to get 10A out of a wall wart; you will need a high amp power supply...or use the right tool for the right job, a battery charger, which you already have. why don't you just leave your battery charger hooked up and have your DPDT (controlled by your solar controller) switch the 120VAC to it.

All this is really just a kludge though IMO, you should be focusing on finding out WHY your battery is discharging. I see no reason why it should. there should only be a mA drain on it, which should be more than compensated for by the solar charger. There should be no reason why the battery cannot be kept charged by solar charger, unless there is a fail somewhere in the circuit. you should (especially if you plan to continue tinkering with electrical/electronics) invest in a multimeter, so you can track down the offending component.

 

I will do more investigating...I plan to get a multimeter soon. Thanks for all the help Strantor! Right now I just need a back up just in case for any reason the battery fails.

 

Is their a component or relay that I can wire in series with my LED's, to control how long they stay on for. I would like them to only stay on for 1 or 2 hours then shut off, without using a timer.

 

Is their a component or relay that I can wire in series with my LED's, to control how long they stay on for. I would like them to only stay on for 1 or 2 hours then shut off, without using a timer.

Well, I would describe a timer as "a component or relay that I can wire in series with my ______ to control how long they stay on for" so, a component that matches your description that is not a timer, I think not. If you had a microcontroller, you could use it to run your LEDs and program the timer into it.

 

In my reading I ran across something that when power was supplied to it, it only ran for a period of time. By saying it wasn't a timer I meant that I didn't set a time to turn on and a time to turn off. I want a simple solution to controlling how long something runs once power is applied. Thanks for your help again! I just wish I could remember, I'm thinking it was in the line of a relay. I will have to look again...