Off the shelf lighting system at cabela's shed light

Thanks for the great information. I have looked over the many ideas presented.

The Cabela's Shed Light is a good option for KISS - and I may use one of their outdoor motion sensor lights.

The Harbor Freight kit seems a bit under powered for my needs (there is a great thread at www.homesteadingtoday.com covering the Harbor Freight kit from earlier this year).

I went into one of our local Solar Sales and Installation businesses. One of their system designers greeted me, shook my hand, and after I told him of my simple needs he immediately roughed out numbers well up and over $1,000 with 2 panels, high end equipment, the works! Kinda the 'Tim the Tool Man' approach - "What we need here is MORE POWER!" Yeah...I won't be contacting them again.

One avenue I am persuing further is another local company (that does ship across the country) called Pacific Renewables. They primarily sell used solar panels at about 1/3 the cost of new. I am looking at purchasing from them a used 80W panel, decent quality new charge controler, mounting rack, and wiring from panel to charge controler for about $350.00. That's pretty close to Harbor Freight's retail price for their kit with a far stronger panel and a superior charge controler. The rest of the set up will be the same using either system - battery, interior wiring, and light fixtures.

To get the quantity of lights I need from Cabela's I would have to spend about $400, including shipping.

To go the hard-wire route from the house, I would easliy be up to $1,000 building to code (with or without a permit) - so that is not an option.

Any more thoughts or ideas on this project would be more than welcomed!

Hope you find a system that works for you, in the meantime thanks for mentioning Pacific Renewables, sounds like a great deal for their used equipment. I've already bookmarked their site for some future plans I've got.

John E

Just a quick clarification as there are two very similarly named websites.

The company I spoke with and am looking to purchase a system from is at www.pacificrenewablesgroup.com and is based in Northern California, the other website is based in Hawaii.

FYI - I am not affiliated with this company, nor have I purchased anything from them yet.

Thanks, I did get some interesting possibilities when I did a google search for pacific renewables but I found the correct one.

Let us know when/if you do buy one of their systems, it sounds like a very good deal compared to a lot of other solar equipment I've been pricing.

John E

Great News!

I have the system installed and it is up and running fine.

The package I purchased from Pacific Renewables Group cost $350.00 and included a used 80w Solec panel (made in the USA!), Morningstar Charge Controler, mounting brackets, and 15' of out door 10 guage wire. I ended up setting the panel on a post about 75' away from the outbuildings as the southern exposure was so much better there. I purchased three RV/TT 12v dc dual dome light fixtures from a local parts and service department at a local RV dealership(I will replace the incandescent bulbs with leds eventually). The lights went into the pig pen bedding area, storage room, and chicken coop. I found a great 12v timer from www.super-feed.com . The model number is the TS-08 (about $80 delivered). It can function at 6v or 12v dc and switches on (and off) the lights in the chicken coop each morning at 4:30AM (and off at 7:20AM). This should keep us with eggs all winter! Last I found two 12v dc fans at www.wholesalemarine.com which I installed in the pig pen. They were about $20 a piece delivered (there were several comparable online options, but this one ended up with my business). There were another $200 in electrical wiring, conduit, switches, etc. and $75 for a 105ah deep cycle marine battery which came from a local auto parts store. My budget was waning, so I opted not to spend the additional $100+ on an AGM battery.

One step I added, at the recommendation by the folks at Pacific Renewables Group, was an in-line 15 amp fuse between the battery and my junction box for my fixtures. This should protect the fixtures should the battery ever go squirelly. The charge controller has a built in fuse between the panel and the battery, so the system is reasonably well protected.

I still may purchase one of the motion sensor lights from Cabela's and tie it into my system.

I'll try to post some pictures tomorrow.

Wow sounds awesome.

Looking forward to pictures

OK, so this is a pretty dumb question...but...how do I upload photos?

I'ld like to upload them off my computer, but the 'enter an image' option wants me to link a photo from a url.

Thanks for the help.

You have to have a place on-line to store them, most internet service providers give you some storage space for this. Contact your provider and ask if they have space for you and then ask how to upload them. Everyone is different so we can’t tell you how to do this, you need to go to your provider.

The second part is to link to the picture you want to show. To do this, once uploaded go look at the picture and when it’s on your screen, right click on it use the “copy image location" tab. Then when you make a post, go to the full reply screen and the 4th box over from the left above the reply area, click on it and I then click on the first line in the pop-up menu (insert a non floating image) then paste the address in the box.


To check it click on preview post to get a look at your post before you actually post it.

If your provider does not offer hosting space, or you just don’t feel like going that route, there are several web sites that are specifically designed to host images for forum and blog posting. The ones I see used most frequently are TinyPic, ImageShack, and Photobucket. TinyPic and ImageShack do not even require you to register an account to host an image with them. There are also several other sites that do the same thing, although their names and URLs are not coming to me right now. Check them out and see which one suits you best.