Mounting Solar Panels

[MaxxFusion]

I got a set of 4x20 solar panels for this season and am starting to plan where I will place them and how. I origanally thought I would mount it to my 4x4s on my privacy fence but then thought that the weight of the water passing through may not be a good idea. I next thought I would build a frame out of treated 2x4s.

How have you mounted your solar panels?

thanks,
Frank

[Ellie]

I used to have mine side by side on the ground; but I just mounted them on the fence. I don't know how this will work, end to end, but I am working on it with Poconos and Carl D.

I will let you know how it turns out but I am sure glad to have them up and out of the way.

Ellie

[MaxxFusion]

I used to have mine side by side on the ground; but I just mounted them on the fence. I don't know how this will work, end to end, but I am working on it with Poconos and Carl D.

I will let you know how it turns out but I am sure glad to have them up and out of the way.

Ellie

So you have yours mounted on your fence? Have you noticed any problems with this? That is what I would really like to do. Gets them up off the ground and out of the way. Thinking I should just get the roof mount kit to help mount it easier. I was also thinking about building the bottom of the panels out a bit to get them closer to a 45 degree angle.

Thanks

[huenix]

I got a set of 4x20 solar panels for this season and am starting to plan where I will place them and how. I origanally thought I would mount it to my 4x4s on my privacy fence but then thought that the weight of the water passing through may not be a good idea. I next thought I would build a frame out of treated 2x4s.

I dont have any advice for you, but I too am interested in how the fence idea works. I am trying to figger out which solar panel kit to buy, and with the shape of my yard and where the sunlight hits, I can either mount mine on the fence, or run a rather long set of pipes to get it on the roof of the house. My hope was to build a small frame to mount against the fence.

It would be really good if my garage was turned 90 degrees, because I could mount it there, but it would get no light.

[cnk]

Would the fence not be too vertical? The pvc pipe sounds really good, but I wonder if we would have problems with the wind blowing it around. I'll have to give this idea to my husband.

[TheWags]

So how did the fence mounting work out? What is the panel framed by? What did you use to secure? I am attempting this project this weekend and need all the help I can get!

[prh129]

I'm planning on installing my solar heater this weekend. Originally I was against laying it on the ground but then I read in one of the other posts that one of the benefits to the ground is it heats up under the panel during the day and that heat continues to transfer to the panel after the sun goes down. This won't happen with a rack. I am going to make the stone border around the pool wide enough so that the panel can lay on top of the stone.

If you go to the fafco website, I think they have plans for building a rack if anyone needs them.

Peter

[NWMNMom]

Due to limited space and available sun, ours will be mounted on a rack system made from pvc and chicken wire (hubby's design) which will be mounted into the ground between some trees and the pool so that they start even with the top rail and go to a 30 degree angle away from the pool. They should receive full sun all day in that spot. Not the prettiest but should be space efficient and work well. We will plumb them so that all panels receive flow and return flow to the pool at about the same time rather than in a series receiving the heated water from the one before it. Diagram attached may be pretty small but we have a bigger one we can email out - we met our quota for attachments

[roxy]

Here is my rack, built from pressure treated plywood and 2x4's........