I am doing a class project. My project is to design solar panels that follow the sun for our robot. I was wondering if someone could tell me the easiest way to accomplish this.

What you need sounds like a solar tracking system. You need a large flat panel that tilts and then you put the solar panels on top of this panel. Now the easiest way to get the panel to track the movement of the sun is just to put the flat panel that tilts on a timed motor. So the sun moves across the sky from east to west. So you time the motor to run, say 12 times a day, once an hour. Each hour the motor turns on and runs for just a few seconds. When the motor runs, it tilts the solar panels a little (a certain degree) to follow the sun.

Check out this video on a manual solar panel tilt mechanism. It might give you some ideas for your class project.

Duration : 0:1:30

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