Wasted $200 on a portable solar charger that barely works

I bought this foldable solar panel kit off Amazon back in March thinking it'd be great for camping trips. Spent like $200 on it after reading all the glowing reviews. Took it out to the desert near Moab last month and it only put out like 5 watts on a sunny afternoon. The charger claimed 100 watts but after testing it with a multimeter, I got nothing close. Turns out the cheap cells they use just can't handle real sunlight unless you angle them perfectly every 20 minutes. Anyone else get burned by one of these overhyped solar gadgets?

2 comments

2 Comments

the_sean3d ago

...and that's exactly why I still have a drawer full of those cheap USB fans that claim to be "solar powered" but just suck. I bought one off a Facebook ad last summer for like 15 bucks, thought it'd be perfect for chilling in the backyard. Thing barely moved air even on a 90 degree day, and the solar panel was basically a joke - it died completely by mid-August. These Amazon brands are just drop shipping the same garbage from China with different logos.

michael_patel3d ago

“claims to be 'solar powered' but just suck” - man, you nailed it @the_sean. My buddy Mark went through the exact same thing last year. He grabbed one of those from a weird Amazon reseller that had like 50 positive reviews, all fake. He set it up on his patio table for a cookout and the thing barely hummed. The little solar panel was maybe the size of a deck of cards and the fan stopped spinning if a cloud went by. He left it out for a week and the plastic cracked right down the middle from the sun. Now it's sitting in his garage next to a pile of other junk that was supposed to be "outdoor rated".