Solar Powered Go Kart

In this project we took a go kart frame designed to take a gas engine and made it electric and solar powered. It uses a 48V SLA battery pack with a EMC-ME0909 Brushed DC motor, 0-5k Ohm Pot Box throttle, Alltrax 4834 controller and an Astronergy 5612M 190W solar panel to charge the pack. Runs great with a top speed of ~20-25mph, and because of the solar panel a potentially infinite range!

A full description of this project can be seen at www.therenewableyou.com.

A description of all of the parts, the cost of the parts and where we go the parts from is available as a PDF at this link here. The PDF also includes some notes about the electrical design. The entire project cost about $2500, including shipping on the parts. Some welding and machine work was required.

The baseline of the electrical system is from the Alltrax electrical diagram for EVs, at this link here. It has wall chargers but the primary source of energy is the solar panel on the roof of the kart, which is always on and always charging.

I hope this inspires others to realize that there is no need to wait, the time is now to build solar powered EVs that run off the sun!

This project was sponsored by The Brian Robertson Foundation and Quickgit.com.

Engineers Who Built It:

Will Bagienski , Adam Plesniak , Luis Torres

Comments

[Peterc356]

Hello, My name is Peter. I am currently doing this project as a research project for the Science National Honors Society. I have a few questions on the project. How do you know what exact wattage and voltage of solar panel to get for the kart? I can't seem to find any info on this. If you could please reply that would be a huge help. Thank you.
-Peter

[jem sands]

awesome

[fglc0983]

I've really enjoyed reading about your project, and kudos to your success! I had a question regarding the 3A battery chargers you used. I'm new to solar, so I am just trying to figure out all the little odds and ends. Are the wall chargers necessary, or could the solar charge controller be left to handle charging the batteries?

[DaltonD4]

My class is building a solar go kart but we don't know what size motor and what solar panels we need. Can someone help me with that?

[skumu]

Hello,I am a student also working on Solar Powered Electric Go-Kart. Is possible to figure out theoretically relation between current

supplied to motor and speed outputted ? Or between power and speed ? Like If I have 350 W and I am going 5mph for how far I can get? ( Theoretically cause I know I speed is not always constant and there is wind, friction, and other)

[RenewableYou]

Well, 350W is a measure of power, but if you to find out how far you can get at a certain speed you need to talk about energy, which is power over time. It is certainly possible to relate the current / voltage of a battery to the distance you can travel in an EV. The relationship of power and speed depends on many things, such as the gearing of the system, ect.

[DaltonD4]

We are building a solar go kart. What do I need

[SkS19]

Hello Sir, I'm working on this model. Can you please tell me the dimensions of this kart.

[Rowster09]

awesome! i'm going to try to make that

[RajatS16]

hello sir...i m working over dis project and i need to know dat which type of brakes will be most suitable for solar go kart with its max speed 30-40mph.

[847MicRoss]

I don't have much info on this project but here's what I know.

Location : Freedom Field , Rockford Illinois

Its a 250 watt panel , top speed of 30mph

[rpradeep1]

have u made thi project

[flynn.gregory.7]

Can the solar panel power the motor with the power from the batteries?

[ankita ranjan]

we are making a solar powered vehicle as our project.So,we wanted to know about the motor specifications for a vehicle weighing 300 kg, including the persons weight .We wanted to know about the speed controller specifications too. Our vehicle have 2 solar panels giving total of 200 W as output .

[RenewableYou]

Hi Ankita. 300kg, inclusive of the passenger weight, is about the weight that we had on this project, therefore I recommend a motor and controller similar to what we used. The best reference for our work is this document (http://www.therenewableyou.com/[e-mail]). The other great reference is the circuit diagram from Electric Motorsport, which is at this link (http://electricmotorsport.com/ev-parts/controllers/brushed-motor-controllers/alltrax-axe4834-24-48v-300a.html#)

[ELLINAJ1023]

how does a 15hp brushed dc motor run with 190W solar panel source?

[RenewableYou]

The panel is 190W rated, 24V wired. The 24V panel charges the 24V battery pack via a Morningstar charge controller. Then the 24V pack runs the motor via a PWM motor controller set to run on a 24V circuit. Most of the info is in the video and the parts list.

[oldskoolhead]

i was thinking i could put a roof on my electric bike and add a solar pannel but thought a 200w solar pannel would likely be too big for a bike and possibly unsafe in the wind, though they do have rooves on those bmw bikes but not quite this big lol
i was wondering if it was 200-250w had pedals and restricted to 15.5mph could 1 of these be driven on the uk roads under the same legal status as an ebike requireing no licence tax mot insurance etc coz i would so build one lol

[czhanacek]

My friends and I were thinking that something like this would be a great summer project. This will certainly give us some great ideas. Thank you!!!

[RenewableYou]

Certainly, you are welcome. I highly recommend it.