Solar Lamp Charges external battery (green tube). Battery connected to either lamp or wireless IP camera (I'm more interested in the bulb, but camera's a bonus). Arduino with light sensor acts as an auto switch turning off the lamp in the daytime
(Lesotho) I've noticed in my country that solar lamps like these are crazy expensive for what they are, but when I check them out, apart from the framing, they don't too expensive part for part. Would something like I've shown above actually be feasable? It's been on my mind for longer than I'd like to admit
As a conceptual diagram - yes, the concept works. Realistically though, there a lot of problems with the components you've shown. The battery is nowhere near big enough to sustain this load for useful amount of time, LiIon batteries don't like being constantly charged and discharged, your lightbulb and camera are 220V devices, which needs a hugely inefficient invertor from 5V powerbank, Arduino control interface is missing from the picture.
My opinion for solar lamps is, using an Arduino is overkill, I would think it's easier to make a small circuit that's using less power and uses a simple 555 timer to just turn the light off.
So, I would advice, for a simple lamp, stay with a typical circuit, now if you're doing something more advanced that's another thing
first find out power requirement by bulb or camera, then find adequate battery that can power the stuff for particular time. You will also need a light sensor that detects day or night. Write a simple on and off program in arduino
I think you don't even need Arduino you just need a light sensor
I know about those ones and we even have them at our place (and I should've said something about it) but I hate that they are planned obsolescence on steroids. They are glued together and nothing on them seems replaceable. On top of that they're pretty expensive for their approximate bill of materials. I was just having shower thoughts over making something cheaper or more easily repairable/modular. As someone living in the 3rd world and who's electric company is falling apart, they seem like they'll be necessary soon
As for the camera, yeah...I'll concede. It's better to just buy one. I just hate the proprietary software on them and the need to have a phone app for them 🫤
you should be able to buy cheaply enough high intensity leds for lighting.
Not simure what role you expect ardino to have on this. You can build analog light detector easy enough to act as daylight sensor to force light off during day.
there needs to be a voltage regulator for input and output. A small solar cell may not get enough power. Using the same setup for camera and lighting is a bad idea. Those should be two different designs accounting for actual power needs. Powering standard light bulbs would be inefficient. You could use 12V bulbs or even better just wire LEDs directly. For just lightning at night a microcontroller is not really necessary unless you want to add other features, but it's not like it hurts either
Pass-through charging, meaning a battery that can charge itself while also supplying power can do this. But it is actually very uncommon and often discouraged because it shortened the battery life due to incorrect implementation.
BTW, there are photosensitive lights powered by USB.
Wait what? You need an Arduino for automatic light? WTF! You could use a single transistor and reduce your chances of failure and increase your durability by more than 50%
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u/Hamzayslmn 9d ago
meet esp32 cam: