In a previous post, I started rambling on about the basic design of a scaled solar tracker we were building as a demonstration. The Google Sketchup design ended up something like this…
Since mechanical fabrication is not our specialty, we cheated a bit and printed scaled “cut-outs” of various pieces to cut and drill. Using SketchUp to do this saved quite a bit of time determining hole and edge layout during fabrication.
Here is a picture of the slewing drive used to rotate the panels.
The panel mounting mechanism shown above is mounted to one side of this drive; a stationary base (typically a pole) is attached to the other. Six 10mm bolts are used on each side in a radial pattern, so this is where the patterns become useful.
After a fair amount of cutting, drilling, grinding, and a bit of welding, the first half of the base is ready to test for fit.
The completed assembly will be described in a future post.
i am pretty new at this solar stuff , but i am really deep into it now, i do my own little welding progects , and wanted to see if i can get get some great ideas . just wanted to say you guys do a really good job..thanks
Hi, Awesome deisgn. What is the part number to your slewing drive. Thanks so much.