“Offers wide range of Solar power input. Has got built in battery charge indicator. Great price for what you get in this Module. There is no info on what is the maximum battery capacity this can charge.”
“I found this when I was looking for components to make a solar power bank. I bought it along with the large 6V 3.5W solar panel that PiHut also sells which fits directly into the solar in jack on this board - although it's a bit of a tight fit! Rather than use the inbuilt battery holder, I used three 18650 cells in parallel plugged into the PH2.0 connector to give 9000mah capacity. I put the solar panel on the window sill and, as might be expected, this setup is a bit slow to fully charge but it is enough to reliably charge my bike lights, garmin gps and gopro batteries pretty regularly throughout the week. Overall, I would say that this is a very useful product. Without it I would have had to use multiple separate boards (e.g. one for battery charging and then maybe a buck / boost board for the USB output) so to have all that integrated into one board is extremely convenient.”
“This is an ideal way to quickly add solar capabilities to a mobile project and I have used several of these now. Add a solar panel (minimum 6V or 9V if you are hoping for it to charge a battery indoors on a window ledge) and a battery and you are good to go. So what's not obvious ? First of all you are not stuck with a 14500 battery, you can use a much larger one connected to the PH2.0 connector instead (a Pi Zero based Internet streaming radio works for approx 17hrs with a 6600mAh battery with no solar assistance). Then you can connect a solar panel AND a USB cable to the module simultaneously to charge the battery / power the device which is not clear from the description. The most obvious application here is to run a device from the battery and have the solar panel "top it up" when it is not in use or to extend the run time of the battery and to use a USB cable to charge the battery if you need it more quickly than the solar panel can charge it on its own. At the time of writing I had the last of The Pi Hut's current stock and hope that they will be getting more.”
