Rewiring a solar light and it now has trouble charging

[FelixtheDog]

Im trying to fit a garden solar light to the roof of my van. I sleep in the back when I go camping and just want something to read by. The trouble is that I had to cut the 2 small wires between the solar panel and the light itself in order to have the solar panel outside, sitting on the roof and the light unit hanging upside down from the roof inside. I also had to extend the wires by approx 3 inches to make it work. Now the light only has a quarter of its previous output, even after sitting in the full sun for 3 days and I cant work out why. It seems that it isnt charging properly and I wondered if it may have something to do with extending the wires (resistance?), but I only extended them by a couple of inches. Can anyone help?

[stanleyman]

I use these in my caravan as nightlights so they are hardly bright enough to read by. The batteries are rechargable so if really dim might need a charge or replacing or connections cleaning. Check the light polarity.

[FelixtheDog]

Thanks stanleyman, but the solar lights I use have 2 LEDs and 3 AA batteries and are excellent for reading and spotlighting things up to 10 metres away. I have replaced the batteries and they are providing bright light at the moment but I still dont know how charging just from the sun will go

[stanleyman]

You will probably find them much better in the summer when there is more sunlight to charge them. It takes a while and dim days don't help. Switch off when not needed.

[FelixtheDog]

Thanks again stanleyman but I live in Australia and it IS summer.

[qapmoc]

How close to the actual cell connection itself did you apply the soldering iron, or was it at the end of the existing wires.
The problem cannot be cable resistance maybe there is a diode in the existing cable which was damaged by the soldering or did you remove a diode which was soldered inline with the cable and you never noticed it.
The point is that most simple photocell chargers have a diode between the cell and the batteries to prevent the power to return to the cell when the light level is too low for charging, if the diode is not fitted or damaged the battery power will discharge back to the solar cell.

[stanleyman]

Is the photocell polarity correct?

I suspected you might be somewhere sunny, *&^%$�"!

[FelixtheDog]

Thanks for the attempted help so far. I have no idea what photocell polarity is and I have not moved or damaged any diodes. I also didnt use a soldering iron at all, I just clipped the (4 inch) wires in half &inserted a new (4inch long) piece in between so I now have an 8 inch wire. To join the wires, I just stripped the end plastic off (1cm) and twisted them together & taped the joins with electrical tape.

[qapmoc]

Well obviously batteries are DC devices so they have a positive and a negative terminal as do photocells, you must make sure that the positive from the photocell is connected to the positive of the battery and the negative is connected to the negative, you will need a basic multimeter to check this out correctly.