Solar Panel Multimeter waveforms
I got a "Solar Panel Multimeter" (Elejoy EY800W) as shown so that I could verify what my panels could do, and it was reasonably priced.
I decided to see exactly how the meter made its measurements. I directly measured the voltage across the panel, and the load current put on it by the meter. I must admit that the panel was outside in the sun but I was crouched in my air conditioned garage with the rest of the instrumentation when the waveforms were captured.
Here is what I saw:
It looks like it does voltage scans by pulling the panel voltage to a series of voltages. I expect that it measures the current (and hence power) at each voltage. It then thinks for maybe 70 milliseconds and does another voltage scan. The scans appear to be homing in on the maximum power point.
Each step is a little bit more than a millisecond, so it does not have to dissipate much total energy in the circuit that loads the panel.
I got to see the waveforms change as clouds covered the sun and it grew quite dark just before a rain storm.
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