HELP! Need advice on Lighting (1 Viewer)

[Captain Sanuk]

Hello, My name is Ty. I have been on mud for a while and always been into cruisers. I am currently working on completing my eagle scout project and need some help from mud. Here is my situation- I am making a cement pedestal at the base of a flagpole. On the cement pedestal i will be mounting some sort of solar powered light to illuminate the flag during night time hours. I have done research on lights and solar panels but i am far from an expert. I am hoping someone on here with some industry knowledge can chime in and help me out. The flag sits at about 20 ft above the ground. I need to know how much wattage I need and how big a panel I will need depending on light. The light needs to be heavy duty enough to withstand weather and occasional abuse from kids (flag is located in a park) I was thinking about wiring up an LED spot pod. Is that possible? All help is appreciated.
Thank you in advance
Ty Evans Troop 745

 

[Captain Sanuk]

here are my designs

 

[Captain Sanuk]

 

[TheForger]

First, congrats on almost making it to Eagle Scout! I made Eagle through Troop 30 in November '14 and haven't regretted it yet. I won't be much help as far as what size panels you will need, but I do have a couple design's you might want to look at. I do know a few small tips about solar power such as the solar panels should always face the equator, due south since we're in the northern hemisphere. The angle of inclination should be somewhere close to your latitude in degrees - slightly more than your latitude will favor the winter sun and slightly less than your latitude will favor summer sun. You want to light the flag so instead of mounting the light on top of the concrete pedestal, why not mount two a few feet out from the pedestal on the ground? That is how most flags & flag poles are illuminated and it would be easy to route the wires underground. Take a look at this design I made, the gray rectangle represents the solar panel

 

[Captain Sanuk]

First off, thank you for taking the time to draw up that design! That is almost exactly what i was thinking but after meeting with some leaders about approval they said the lights need to be up out of the way. Imo i think what you have shown would be the best way for illuminating the flag, but we have to work with the fact that the flag its located in the center of a park that is used for many scouting activities. we know all too well that cub scouts and tenderfoots all have a tendency to climb on things and run around. I want the lights to be protected from that as much as possible. I am working on my final designs to be submitted by Thursday. i will post up when I get close.

here is what I thought might be a better location for the lights. This will allow me to use up to three lights mounted directly to the pole. Anyone have experience with these lights?

 

[TheForger]

Hey bud, any updates on this project?