HB7 : Solar Security Light Teardown
Electronic parts from Harbor Freight??
Synopsis : A new solar powered security light from Harbor Freight is torn down for its parts. (Sept 5, 2014)
My Hackaday Prize entry needs a solar charged battery back to power the sensor and transmitter I'm placing in front of my house. Rather than spending a whole lot of time finding domestic suppliers of small photovoltaic panels and trying to spec a nicad or nimh battery pack, I decided to buy a "60 LED Solar Security Light" from Harbor Freight just a few miles from here. The list price was $32.99US, but it was on sale, plus I had a 20% off coupon so it ended up costing me about $20.00US. I doubt that once you consider shipping, I could have bought a solar panel and battery back for less than that. What's more, I ended up with a big LED panel and a motion detector module for use in future projects.

Here is the video of my teardown and analysis of the light:





Additional Notes

Here's a link to the Security Light on Harbor Freight. NOTE: Products at Harbor Freight change very frequently, so by the time you are reading this the link may well be bad. If that happens just search the Harbor Freight site for "Solar Light" and you'll probably find very simular products.

Link to my light: 60 LED Solar Security Light

Link to HF home page: http://www.harborfreight.com/



Questions and comments? You can find me on Twitter.
or Email me at hackersbench (at) gmail




This page has instructions and plans for building a round circular LED ring display that can be used for many different projects and with many different microcontrollers. It includes the schematic and parts list and directions to get the printed circuit board.