When we first purchased Acadia, it only had 200 watts of solar panels installed. This was basically enough to run our refrigeration and freezers and not much else unless we were motoring and charging via our 120amp alternator. We knew this wasn’t going to work out well for us in the Bahamas, where we planned to spend months at anchor and motor as little as possible. This meant we needed to find a way to have between 400-600 watts of solar panels, and as usual, we didn’t want it to look ugly!
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Picking A Location for Installing Solar Panels on the Boat
On cruising boats, there are four main ways that sailors mount their solar panels. As with anything boating related you can find people who love or hate any of these options. All of the options are a compromise in one way or another, so you have to weigh the pros and cons of each with your needs.
1. Build an Arch
There are both pre-fab and custom-made arch options. Arches usually hang off the stern and are made of aluminum or stainless steel and panels are mounted to the top. On our Alberg 30, Ecola, we made a custom arch to hold 400W of solar on a slide system. If you’re interested in more info on this, check out this video!
Pros–Lots of horizontal space for solar, can double as dinghy davits and can be used to store other equipment.
Cons–Expensive, large, heavy, and depending on the boat it can detract from the aesthetics.
2. Use existing cockpit structures
On a lot of cruising boats the cockpit canvas, i.e. bimini, and dodger, already take up a lot of the horizontal space that would be great for solar panels. That space can be used for both sun and weather protection and solar panels. The panels are mounted to the tubing that gives the canvas its shape.
Pros–One of the Least expensive options, blends in and is generally unobtrusive.
Cons–Space limited to the existing footprint, shadowing can be a problem, makes stowing canvas more difficult, and airflow to panels can be problematic.
3. Mount on cabin top or deck.
This is primarily used by multi-hulls with large coach roofs or a forward deck instead of trampolines. You will see this on some monohulls and it is usually on the area under the boom or just forward of the mast.
Pros–Easy installation, large area available on multi-hulls, shading typically not an issue.
Cons–Glue down panels make a big mess that is difficult to remove or you have to drill lots of holes in your boat.
4. Lifeline-mounted fold-out panels.
These are those “wing” type panels you may have seen that are folded down while underway and fold out at anchor.
Pros–Easy to install, and doesn’t take up a lot of space.
Cons–Easy to damage, shading can be a real problem, and cannot be used *easily* underway.
We chose a combination of using our existing cockpit structures and mounting on the cabin top. Acadia is a Tartan 37, and an IOR design, so the boom is relatively short for her overall length. That means that our bimini is not shaded by the boom. Our cockpit is also on the larger side, which means the square footage of our bimini was large enough to fit two 200-watt rigid panels. We used Gemini Marine products concave post rail mounts to attach the panels to our existing bimini tubing using aluminum bars and plates. This has given us a very sturdy 400 watts just on our bimini alone.
We also have enough space on our dodger to fit a 100-watt flexible panel. We mounted a second 100-watt flexible panel just forward of the dodger on the cabin top and we have a third 100-watt panel that can be attached to the sunshade that goes between our bimini and dodger that we can use when at anchor for extended periods. That gives us 600 watts of permanently installed panels, with the option to add an additional 100 watts, plenty for our needs including running our electric watermaker.
Flexible vs Rigid Solar Panels
Flexible panels are easy to install, conform to curve shapes, are low profile, and are lightweight. But they come with a few downsides including, higher cost per watt, a limited life spa; constant flexing can crack the electrical connections inside the panel, and the sun will eventually degrade the plastic. Broken electrical connections can cause high resistance, which can be a fire hazard, so it’s important to check these panels regularly and follow manufacturer specifications for installation.
Rigid Panels are less expensive per watt but they are more difficult to mount. They have a long life and are typically more power dense so you need less square footage. By design, they usually have built-in air flow under the panels, and cracking of electrical connections isn’t typically an issue. The downsides are they are heavy and breakable, and the frames can be flimsy.
We’ve chosen to install a mix of both panel options because it helped us to optimize the space we have available. We have a love-hate relationship with our flexible panels. They are our lowest output and highest maintenance. We have also had two panels fail in just the two years we’ve been cruising.
Parts List
The following are the parts we used for our solar installation.
- 2 200w Rich Solar Panels
- 3 100w Renogy Solar Panels
- 5 Solar Adaptor Pigtails
- 6 Gemini Rail Mounts
- Aluminum Plate
- Aluminum Bar
- Wire
- 2 20amp Vitron Charge Controllers
- 1 15amp Victron Charge Controller
- Victron Smart Battery Sense
- Blue Sea 6 Circuit Fuse Block
- Blue Sea Circuit Breaker
- Blue Sea 150a Bus Bar
Links to all of these products, except the Gemini mounts can be found on our Amazon storefront.
Gemini rail mounts
Solor panels rigad