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sun.
Unfortunately this is accomplished only if solar panels are rotated by the sun. This is the purpose of this diy
solar tracker system or if you have an Arduino board then you can build this one that uses a servo.
The solar tracker circuit uses a window comparator to maintain the motor in a idle state as long as the two
LDRs are under the same illumination level. In this case, half the voltage is applied to the noninverting input of
A1 and to the inverting input of A1.
When the sun position is changing so does the illumination level on the LDRs and the input voltage for the
window comparator is no longer half of the supply voltage thereby the output of the comparator generates
informations for the motor that rotates the panels for tracking the sun.
diy sun tracking sensor
The LED arrangement in the LM339 circuit below uses two rows of three LEDs with each LED connected in
parallel, the two rows are connected in parallel but reversed polarity. The sensor array is made with three west
LEDs and three east LEDs. A 1meg resistor and a 10n ceramic capacitor (103z) are also in parallel with the
sensor. The sensor LEDs provide input voltage for two comparators on the LM339 chip with the variable
resistor R2 providing a "dead zone" or sensitivity adjustment. Each comparator output is fed into a transistor
Darlington pair which in turn drives the DC motor. The rail voltages are provided by two batteries connected in
series with the center tap providing the ground reference. We have tested this circuit with 2 single cell lithiumion batteries providing +/- 4.2 volts and two 12 volt lead batteries, the LM339 is rated for input voltages from
+/- 2 volts to +/- 18 volts.
This circuit is the result of the design efforts of Mike Mladejovsky, PhD EE. who helped us solve issues with
the solar tracker #3 circuit via the Electronics Tech Online Forum which we highly recommend to anyone
needing help understanding electronic circuits.
Many of the components in the following parts list can be substituted with equivalent components such as using
a AN6912 comparator instead of a LM339. We use 5mm clear green super bright LEDs with a 40deg viewing
angle but any clear lens LED should work for the sensor. 1/4 or 1/2 watt resistors are adequate, fuses should be
placed on each rail and a DPDT switch can be used also.
Below is the printed circuit board artwork for the LM339 circuit. The board is 4.0cm x 4.0cm as measured by
the hash marks. The traces are 1mm which should allow you to etch the board using the lazer printer method.
On the artwork "B" indicates the battery connections, "M" is the DC motor connections and the LED
connections are at the top left. The red dots indicate connections to the positive +12volt rail, the green dots are
the -12volt rail connections and the yellow dots are the virtual ground.
Resize this image to aprox 8cm width and maintain the aspect ratio and you should get the proper size printout
depending on your printer. Check the width of the bar at the bottom and right after printing it should be exactly
37mm.
Below is an updated version of the PCB. We have reversed the orientation of the power transistor Q1, changed
the pad layout for the potentiometer and enlarged the pads for the all the external connections, the power
transistors and the potentiometer.