The Unisolar brand has no glass, thus the light weight. Yes, I have
seen the old Millenia modules which are glass framed and heavy.
Initially, thin film have a higher short term decay rate, which is
why the Unisolar are made to put out more than their rating when
first installed. Keep in mind that, unless things have changed for
the Sharp co. over the past few years, that Sharp brand modules have
been known to be one of the most over-rated modules on the market.
Meaning that they do not put out their rated output even when new.
Joe
On Aug 24, 2007, at 11:35 PM, Christopher Zach wrote:
soltrak wrote:
As far as I know, thin film modules such as the Unisolar brand are
lower efficiency. However they are lighter weight, pretty much
unbreakable, do VERY well in low light conditions and are much
more heat tolerant compared to single crystal modules. And their
rated wattage is more than accurate which can't be said for most
poly or single crystal modules.
Perhaps, however the thin film I have used (the Solarex Millenia)
didn't do well in clouds and was dropping power after 3 years in
the sun, and was as heavy as a chunk of lead. I took it off the
shed roof and replaced it with a set of three MSX80's.
It did put out more than rated power at first, but after 6 months I
noticed it was starting to drop. That appears to be a problem; they
decay in sunlight much quicker than other types of panels.
This may be fixed at some point, Millenia was the first generation
technology.
Chris
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