Affordable Van Life Solar: GRECELL 200W Portable Solar Panel - 6 Months Later

hi everyone welcome back to my next video today we're testing solar panels as you can see these are the fabric folding panels uh this one is a grel you could be really surprised what you can get for a little bit of money and I think this grel is one that qualifies for that condition um it I've had it for six months now I've had it setting out a lot it's been beat up by wind uh so it's it's gotten a you know wind storms has been through many windstorms uh got rained on so uh I think I've given it a really fair shot and it's held up really well it works just as well today as it did when I first set it up so the durability seems really good the price is really good that's I think that's a good price for a 200 watt panel this size the the this features and there are several things about this panel that make it stand apart the I think the quality of the construction is unusually good I I think this is going to be more durable than most it seems to be have kind of a laminated uh F uh feel to it it's I think it's better than nearly all the other fabric panels I've seen I have questions about most you know they're just Fabric and I think is this going to be hold up over the long haul you set this thing out every day for a year and gets beat up by the weather I think the construction of this is better and therefore warrants a little higher price of course as I always say don't buy a solar panel unless it comes with mc4 this does um and with an mc4 if you lose a c a cable if you break a cable you can just go to Amazon and buy a new cable mc42 everything is available uh the most common ones are Anderson connectors ax60 you may never have heard of that that's becoming a very very common connector Now 60 and 90 but the 90 is only on the big stuff so it'll be a 60 and of course the 8 millimeter or 5.5 mm those are the ones that are most common 8 millimeters on both the jackary and the bluetti and and and I think a lot of others too so an 8 m cable to an 8 millimeter adapter so it'll go for the mc4 to 8 millimeter that's a really really good thing well that is an area where this one excels I mean it really excels and stand out as better than almost any other panel it comes with this mc4 to fourway adapter uh having most of the ones I just mentioned on the other end see it has four cables coming out of the end it's one into four and the other four are of course an 8 millimeter so this will plug right into your blue Edie most your Jackies on the majority of of of power stations are going to take 8 millimeter and you've got it the next one is an xt60 again that is becoming and will become more in the future a very very common adapter so this 4 in1 cable uh will do that and Anderson and that's really common Anderson is the oldest I think of all of them and uh works one of the best of all of them but it's not terribly terribly common and finally it's a mini Aviation plug and that's not the norm at all I don't know why they gave you that I think there would have been a better choice but there it is and maybe more and more of them are going to use uh mini aviations in the future at any rate having the three most common and one less common in in a one cable from your mc4 I think this is this cable I'd spent a lot of money on this cable just to have to know if they if Amazon was selling just this cable for up to 50 bucks I'd buy it because it's got four in one in it and I think this is this is a really really really exceptional deal to get this on this panel so the so I think the construction is good I think what it comes with is good mc4 connectors uh price is just a little higher than I would like to pay but I think for the construction and the cable uh it's a pretty good deal so how much power is it putting out well it's completely normal uh I've just I've just tested it uh and it's about 4:30 closer to 5 now in the afternoon Sun's getting lower on the horizon and it's putting out 140 watts and that's completely normal 140 Watts people say why doesn't put out the full 200 because the the manufacturers test under ideal conditions and there's nowhere near ideal conditions here right now perfectly fine that's that's very good produces a completely normal acceptable amount of power um has worked just super well for me this panel has been nothing but great I would give it 100% recommendation if this comes to out to a buying decision I think if you're uh if uh the better construction and the better cable might offset a little bit higher price if price is uh highest priority they're cheaper panels although I'm not sure they will last as long as this one so it's your your call uh you'll have to make that decision best price or a little higher quality so here's the Grell solar panel setting out it's a goodlooking solar panel uh I think the quality of construction is uh better than most most I would definitely say the quality of construction is is definitely a little Superior to most of these 200 watt panels that I've tested or seen it's good panel so everyone here's the grel seen from the side it's just fine construction's good stands up uh in wind and weather just fine I've had it accidentally get rained on Cody's walked on it um lots of dust have blown on it and it's just fine here we're at the back of the grel you can see the legs are just very standard quality seems just fine they stand up well velcro is good it's a great panel highly highly recommended uh I would buy it in a heartbeat all right thanks a lot for watching hope you got something out of this video if you did like us on YouTube subscribe to the channel hit that thumbs up button and we'll talk to you later bye now

Channel: CheapRVliving

Views: 19,010

Keywords: car, van, RV, Full-time, nomad, camper, camp, boondock, travel, caravan, tiny, house, RTR, Bob Wells, Nomadland, CheapRVLiving, Cheap RV Living, vanlife, van life, how to live in a van, van dwelling, van tour, van conversion, living in a van, camper van, van build, diy van build, sprinter van, van living, #vanlife, van dweller, campervan, vandwelling, diy camper van, RV Life, Living in an RV, Class B, Class C, Truck Living, Living in a car, boondocking, Living in a RV

Id: CcxcXynCWcI

Length: 6min 27sec (387 seconds)

Published: Mon Oct 09 2023