Hi, pre-purchase question: I’d like to mount the outdoor monitor in a place I don’t have a power outlet, would a battery pack be sufficient, and for how long more or less? I live in an apartment building and the balcony where I do have an outlet receives direct sun. I do however have a window with a ledge that’s in the shade the whole day, so thought I could put it there, since I read better not to put it in the direct sun. Thnks
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Just a thought, but, there are power banks out there that will actively charge while they’re in use. I think they’re called passthrough power banks or something like that. I have an old Anker that does this. It would be possible to connect the sensor to the power bank and then connect a small solar panel to the battery bank. This would allow the solar panel to act as a trickle charger during the day while running off of the battery bank 24/7. You would just have to make sure that the power output of the battery pack and the solar panel are more than what the sensor draws.
I used my Anker out back with the sensors for the 30 minutes or whatever it was to get a baseline calibration and they worked fine. I also use it to move the sensor around different parts of my house to see if there are any different measurements between locations in a room due to maybe HVAC vents blowing or being too close to a window, etc… The outdoor sensor ran for about 2 days on my battery bank (fully charged) before it died while I was deciding where to place it. I don’t have it in direct sun but it still reads at least 10 degrees higher than it should so that’s a work in progress.
Interesting ideas to consider, thanks.
This post has a link to a build that another user did for a solar-powered setup that I think looks quite nice: Air Gradient Solar Powered
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