Solar Panel Charging?

[D0222]

We just purchased and installed our Arlo Pro 2 camera in the front of our house with the solar panel so we wouldn’t have to mess with climbing a ladder to get it down and charge it. It’s cloudy today and going into fall/winter we’re going to have a lot of these days for the next 6 months. We live on a busy street so our camera gets a lot of activity but our battery isn’t charging hardly at all with the solar panel actively charging it, and now it’s not charging at all. I was under the impression that the solar panel would keep the camera charged at all times but our camera is almost dead and I don’t want it to die overnight. With it being $80 I’m surprised it doesn’t work better than this. Does anyone know more about this problem? Should we return it and get our money back? It doesn’t seem worth the money at this point and we’ve only had it for 24 hours!

[Jintek]

Arlo solar panels are definitely not the fastest chargers compared to other systems. I get around 350-425 motion alerts a day. I have my motion detection set to high 100%. Definitely do not do this with sound sensitivity I would keep that at a 1 or 3. Not a 5, that makes it way to sensitive. And can drain your battery fast at night when it doesn’t charge. At the end of each day my camera is usually at 95-100% charged. I have my recording set up until motion stops. That can go up to 300 seconds. Realistically I get around 11-35 seconds of recording. Keep in mind I get 350-450 recordings a day. My camera battery can drop all the way down to 65% but by the time the sun goes down at 5-6:00 PM, I am back up to 95-100% charged. I hope this helps some.

You may have just gotten a bad solar panel. I purchased mines from Costco they sell them in 2 packs and offer 5 year returns. I believe I got 2 solar panels for $140.00.

[StephenB]

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@D0222 wrote:
 It’s cloudy today and going into fall/winter we’re going to have a lot of these days for the next 6 months. 

With it being $80 I’m surprised it doesn’t work better than this.

Well it does need sun.  Also if it gets too cold, the camera won't charge (there's a safety requirement here for all lithium batteries).

I use the ultra version with one of my cameras, and it does keep the camera charged enough (generally around 50%).  Though there have been a couple of times when I have taken it inside and charged it.  I live in New England, and we do have our share of cloudy days too.

How often did you need to recharge the camera before you got the panel?  

[Jintek]

I’ve never used the camera without the solar panel.

My solar panel generally charges my camera around 40% per day on sunny days.