Jackery Solar Generator

Pauly

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Thought it was about time i shared my recent testing, Jackery contacted me and asked if i would be interested in testing out some of their kit, my leisure battery failed recently so the timing could not have been better
I have been looking for new power options as im waiting on a T6.1 van which will hopefully be arriving next year at some point so was looking round at alternatives to fixed installs and a solar generator seemed like the obvious way to go

What is a solar generator?
A solar generator can technically refer to a solar solution that combines a portable power station with solar panels. It converts sun energy captured by solar panels into electrical power and then stores it in a portable power station for later use.

I currently have a Jackery Explorer 500 portable power station

Jackery.jpg

Carrycase


SolarSaga 100W portable folding solar panel

Jackery Solar.jpg

Heres what i received from the lovely amazon man

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First up the main unit

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It comes with mains power pack for 230v charging and a 12v lead for in vehicle charging and a small pouch to store them (i wont be using this but more on that later)

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It arrived half charged so i got it connected to mains and left it for a few hours to get it fully charged while i checked out the other bits

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Heres the bag i received

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Seems well made, tight fitting zips look to make a nice seal and bag looks well insulated and the unit is a nice snug fit

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Lid pocket is good size to hold the shoulder strap and supplied charging cables

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Nice coincidence that when you remove the inner packing from the box the unit slides back in there nicely for storage

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Solar panel is a standard fold in half affair with a pocket housing the attached lead

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Inside the pocket is the link cable and USB connections

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One little extra with this unit is the ability to utilise the USB sockets stand alone so even without the main unit attached you can still charge USB devices

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Panel opened up

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and the fold out legs to stand it up (not that we have much sun to point it at :( )

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When the main unit was fully charged thought i would get my new fridge plugged in and try it out so i left it running for few days to see how it did

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The fridge was empty and set to 5 degrees and left in a heated room in my house so it had some work to do, battery voltage on the fridge (not sure how accurate it is ?) read around 12.6-13.1 volts depending on if the fridge was running or not
Left it to run for a while and came back after 48 hours to the battery reading reading 30%

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I gave it another 24 hours and when i got back from work it had all shut down but the fridge was still cold so i got just short of 3 days run time with no charging so very happy with that, i now know if required and away for a weekend i can run the fridge for a couple days with no issues

Back to charging

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I have connected the solar panel and it works but not really had the weather to test it out thoroughly but i am confident this will do what i need it to do, given that the solar is capable of fully charging the unit in 9.5 hours i am confident that with several hours of moderate sunshine through the day this will be capable of running my fridge pretty much indefinitely
Im hoping to get the unit outside in the next couple days for a few hours if its dry and see what the recharge rate is like on the solar in this winter sun


Verdict
First impressions are good, it seems like a solid bit of kit with good connectivity and look forward to testing it out in the wild
The 230v inverter is pure sine wave so should be good for running electronic equipment (up to 500W) that cheaper inverters cant handle
Its not the cheapest but if it does its job and lasts then its not too bad

This is the 500Wh which is the medium sized unit in their range, they also do a smaller 240Wh unit and a larger 1000Wh unit but for me the medium size unit is about right for capacity vs size/weight vs inverter rating vs cost
 
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Good review/read.
I have a BLUETTI AC200P (very heavy) and have not paid for EHU for nearly a year now. These solar generators are the way ahead for campervans unless you go down the road of LiFePO4 12.8V battery's and inverter, which is my plan next year.
 
I put in a 100w Power Road LifePo4 this year and I’ve not looked back or ran out of power once.

Massive difference over my 175w standard leisure battery.
 
I’m quite liking the portability of it, works in my T6 and as soon as my 6.1 is here can go straight in that, not going to replace a fully installed high demand system but for my needs it works
Have already had it in my work van on a site with no power and worked well keeping power tool batteries charged and also had my laptop running off it, so far so good
 
The black Friday deals have reduced these quite a bit

This is what i got, decent bit of discount

ProductThe Usual PriceDiscountThe Black Friday Price
(Nov 25-29)
Where to Buy
Explorer 240£259.9925% OFF£194.99
Explorer 500£529.9920% OFF£423.99
Explorer 1000£1099.9920% OFF£879.99
SolarSaga 100W£259.9925% OFF£194.99
 
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Just seen Jackery are doing some discounts in the run up to christmas


View attachment 138916

Entry Level: Explorer 240 Portable Power Station – 25% OFF

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B08RNPYLQW

Classic Level: Explorer 500 Portable Power Station – 20% OFF

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B08RNT5BDT

Pro Level: Explorer 1000 Portable Power Station – 20% OFF

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B08RNQ9P2R
Erm. Is this a scam. I'm buying one through PayPal cos i'll get my money back. Sale went through at $98

 
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  • Wow
Reactions: CAB
Erm. Is this a scam. I'm buying one through PayPal cos i'll get my money back. Sale went through at $98

This is what I've ordered. PayPal receipts on a Visa credit card etc etc. So a no brainer. 1500w with 4 panels at £78. The 2000w was only a £5 more.

Now we'll see if Mr Mick has been conned.

 
Looks too good to be true @Mick

I'd say it's a scam..... Data mining for your personal information.

Keep us posted.
 
I've been using something similar - Poweroak 500 that cost £420 for the past year. Most seem to work out at about £1 for every watt. I'm planning to add solar charging for longer trips without hook up, be interesting to see how efficient charging is. I am not planning a leisure battery system as we only need to charge phones/Kindle etc. The only thing I haven't worked out yet is how heater will work.
 
I'm tempted by the Jackery 500 as they seem to have very good reviews all over he place. My roof mounted 160W solar panel is currently hard wired to a Ctek 250SA which is then charging my 110Ah leisure battery. My simple brain says that it would be an easy task to fit connectors which allowed me to simply disconnect the solar panel from the Ctek and then plug it into a Jackery if I bought one (I understand that they have a built in MPPT but cannot find any specs for it). Or am I being too simplistic? This would have the advantage of not having to buy or travel with an additional solar panel but the disadvantage of not being able to reposition it for an optimum charge. Any advice for an idiot please?
 
This is what I've ordered. PayPal receipts on a Visa credit card etc etc. So a no brainer. 1500w with 4 panels at £78. The 2000w was only a £5 more.

Now we'll see if Mr Mick has been conned.

Scam:
 
Scam:
Interesting. The website is still up. I raised this as a scam report with payPal and they say it is legit. So at the mo they wont refund my money. The link you post doesn't claim it is a scam just could be.

I contacted Jackery with the website details. their answer (below) was they only sell via their site or on their Amazon shop. However they are having an issue with fake products..

Hi Mick Kelly,

Thank you for reporting this.

Jackery only sells our product on our official website: www.jackery.com or on our Offical Amazon Store.

We have had reports of some websites selling fake products, and with the help of our excellent customers, we have endeavored to shut down most of them. We will forward this information to our legal department for review and take further action.

Thanks again for your valuable time, and we truly appreciate it!

.
Deatiny has sent me a China post tracking which is not finding anything but that's not unusual for China Post in my experience it can take up to a week for the tracking number to be recognised.

So if it arrives & it is a copy. I may just get a working usable system and I also get my money back from PayPal.

I'll offer the copy to jackery for analysis and a decent discount. Done this before with RayBan and Apple

Sitting here bored with Covid self isolation, something too keep me from going mad but the skiing was good!
 
Interesting. The website is still up. I raised this as a scam report with payPal and they say it is legit. So at the mo they wont refund my money. The link you post doesn't claim it is a scam just could be.

I contacted Jackery with the website details. their answer (below) was they only sell via their site or on their Amazon shop. However they are having an issue with fake products..

Hi Mick Kelly,

Thank you for reporting this.

Jackery only sells our product on our official website: www.jackery.com or on our Offical Amazon Store.

We have had reports of some websites selling fake products, and with the help of our excellent customers, we have endeavored to shut down most of them. We will forward this information to our legal department for review and take further action.

Thanks again for your valuable time, and we truly appreciate it!

.
Deatiny has sent me a China post tracking which is not finding anything but that's not unusual for China Post in my experience it can take up to a week for the tracking number to be recognised.

So if it arrives & it is a copy. I may just get a working usable system and I also get my money back from PayPal.

I'll offer the copy to jackery for analysis and a decent discount. Done this before with RayBan and Apple

Sitting here bored with Covid self isolation, something too keep me from going mad but the skiing was good!
So the shipment has left Shanghai airport and is due delivery 2nd Jan. But PayPal has refunded me.

Am I getting a freebie.

Apparently the scam is that they send something small like a packet of seeds as a small parcel or not ‍

We’ll see!
 
I once bought a cheap Makita tool from china, they provided a tracking no. all that arrived was a small bead in a small padded envelope, got a full refund from ebay.
due to the long shipping time they get to scam quite a few people before that get shut down.
 
Now I'm getting excited. I've had a full refund but will it be a packet of seeds, a ball bearing or a 1500w Jackery solar generator with 4 panels. But this does conflict with the Shanghai tracking they sent.

Edit: Plus I do now have the Royal Mail tracking and confirmation of leaving China!

Screenshot 2021-12-24 at 13.57.26.png
 
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I once bought a cheap Makita tool from china, they provided a tracking no. all that arrived was a small bead in a small padded envelope, got a full refund from ebay.
due to the long shipping time they get to scam quite a few people before that get shut down.
This site has been up since September, PayPal claimed they were legit, Jackery say they are a 'copy' site. So it'll be interesting if anything turns up.

The site has now been taken down. PayPal stopped them using their service and Jackery have got the legal bods onto them.
 
Now I'm getting excited. I've had a full refund but will it be a packet of seeds, a ball bearing or a 1500w Jackery solar generator with 4 panels. But this does conflict with the Shanghai tracking they sent.

Edit: Plus I do now have the Royal Mail tracking and confirmation of leaving China!

View attachment 139635
And its still coming (allegedly). Its now with the airline. Royal Mail confirm the parcel is on it's way!

Are we taking bets on what it is - my money is on a packet of dodgy seeds.

Screenshot 2022-01-04 at 15.36.50.png
 
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