Hi,

I have a large shed about 100m away form where my build is going to be, which I would like to put a security camera on. Mains electricity is not an option yet but I am looking for ideas on how best to run the camera on a combination of using PV and a battery to power both the camera and a 4g router. 

 

Does anyone have any recommendations for such a setup ? I was thinking of using a couple of Ring cameras. I know its not to everyone's tastes but as I have some in use already I thought they would work quite well. 

 

Thanks

 

See what battery voltage they all operate from and try and decide on a dc solution.

 

Do you already have solar panels? Otherwise solar powered Ring Spotlight cameras exist..

 

https://en-uk.ring.com/products/spotlight-cam-solar?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=UK_English_Search_Brand_Cameras_Exact_Google_CPC&utm_content=Security+Cameras_Exact+%2F+ring+spotlight+camera+solar&utm_term=ring spotlight solar&utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=UK_English_Search_Brand_Cameras_Exact_Google_CPC&utm_content=Security+Cameras_Exact+%2F+ring+spotlight+camera+solar&utm_term=ring spotlight solar&gclid=Cj0KCQiA4b2MBhD2ARIsAIrcB-SjN6u1r9iJBYlYME7bpPHn044N8l8KUfiIZYu-UN7kAf0_kJIIFXkaAnRnEALw_wcB

Reolink do 4G cameras with batterys and solar panels. Works very well. 

 

I use them at my site. 

 

https://m.reolink.com/gb/product/reolink-go/?gclid=Cj0KCQiA4b2MBhD2ARIsAIrcB-TqellL423gqaf0P7hGfo0OqSJGPjAOXBvFDJNSzovPmht_Lry4uxUaArKkEALw_wcB

Edited November 13, 20214 yr by SuperJohnG

Do you know what power the router and camera take?

Find that out and working out the rest is easy.

I have a reolink argus eco with solar panel. Works well (when I don't drop the thing and break the mount).

 

Connects to my site WiFi 4g hotspot.

On 13/11/2021 at 19:15, SteamyTea said:

Do you know what power the router and camera take?

Find that out and working out the rest is easy.

 

Sorry about the delay in responding to these messages. Unfortunately I had an unexpected few days in hospital following a farm machinery accident. On the mend now 

 

Anyway, I was looking at the battery powered ring cameras as mentioned by temp. I have a few of these already in other locations and they had proven to be pretty good. So really I need to focus on being able to power the router. I don't currently have any solar panels but I am very willing to get whatever is needed. I am not short of space on the shed roof so perhaps panels would be the answer? Presumably this would require some sort of battery storage which the solar panels would trickle charge?

FWIW I power my Internet router off-grid, though at this time of year it's quite tough (typical domestic router is 12V @ 1A, ie 12W, or ~0.5kWh/d).

 

https://www.earth.org.uk/battery-bank-replacement.html

 

The primary jof of that bank is to keep my servers off-grid all the time, which has been for >> 10 years.  Right now the router (the 'dump' load) is back on mains.

 

http://www.earth.org.uk/_off-grid-stats.html

 

Rgds

 

Damon

Power over Ethernet ( PoE ) will do 100m. Can you run a Cat6 SWA? Can be surface mount if you don't want to dig.

1 hour ago, DamonHD said:

 (typical domestic router is 12V @ 1A, ie 12W, or ~0.5kWh/d).

Eh ... 0.25!

5 minutes ago, DamonHD said:

1 hour ago, DamonHD said:

 (typical domestic router is 12V @ 1A, ie 12W, or ~0.5kWh/d).

Eh ... 0.25!

0.288 kWh.day^-1

But probably idling some of that.

Having looked at Damon's off grid solution it truly looks impressive, although bewilderingly complicated to me. Although it seems to me that perhaps PV's may not give the power required during the winter ? At least not on a small scale.

 

I'm having too rethink the whole approach. 

 

I will try and better explain my dilemma and have attached a crude picture to help set the scene.

 

This is a rural location with our selfbuild hopefully to begin in the spring. The end goal will be to get mains power to the shed, which is about 120 m away from the future house. The nearest electricity pole is about 160 m in the other direction to the house. We were not intending to go live with the electricity until towards the end of t he build. Figuring the build will take 12+ months, that means at least 18 months of no power to the shed hence my initial question to get cameras up an running.

 

We are not having PV on the house but having read the replies here, I was wondering if it would work if I put a typical PV setup on the shed now and then have that link in to the house once completed. Possibly with some sort of battery setup which would be enough to power lights and cameras / router in the shed ? 

 

I am weighing this up against the alternative option of having a temporary meter and digging everything up now. This will be the most effective way and possibly the cheapest in the long run but there is something attractive to being self-sufficient.