UKC

Seems like if I want to take my shiny new 'battery hungry' kit onto the hills for more than 24 hours, then I will need a way of charging them.

Any good solar powered chargers that will keep a smart phone mp3 player, AA and AAA batteries working?

Cheers

In reply to The Lemming: powermonkey traveller, though solar chargers are all a bit slow.
Maplins do a wind-up USB charger. mine seems to work ok!

In reply to thin bob:



Could you please tell me a little more about this wind-up charger?

Do you have to wind-up for hours on end to get it to work?

In reply to The Lemming:

Quick Heads up Millets are selling Power Monkey Classic at £15.

Well, they are in Blackpool at least.

In reply to The Lemming:

On a total punt I bought one of these.. http://www.backpackinglight.co.uk/product559.asp?PageID=1

So far only used it to charge from a usb charge up and not from the power of the sun(well it is winter and all that) but hopefully in the coming weeks I'll get a chance to try it out properly. The updated instructions on the site seem to be fairly accurate from what I've seen of it so far though.

I also have a power chimp and have had mixed results trying to charge up an iPhone 4. The iPod touch charges up no probs though.

In reply to The Lemming:

I've been looking into this recently.

The Goal Zero kit seems to be the way forward. So long as you don't have an Iphone 4 (they are a bit strange apparently)

I'm thinking about picking up a Nomad 7 to hopefully keep my smartphone charged on the go.

In reply to The Lemming: I've got a power chimp, it can charge my ipod but takes absolutely ages to charge a pair of batteries and phone didn't work at all. You can get them dirt cheap off ebay but it might be worth buying two solar panels and a y-connector to speed things up a little.

In reply to The Lemming:

Goal Zero every time for me...

In reply to The Lemming:

Top Tip

They don't charge smart phones.

In reply to The Lemming:

Power monkeys are a total waste of time. Had 6 in pakistan last year and only one worked. The power gorilla was just as bad.

In reply to The Lemming:

I'd be surprised if most modern electronic gadgets won't last "more than 24hrs on the hill." For cameras the best option is to just take two or three spares, saves weight, hassle and expense. Same for handheld GPS units etc - just take spare sets of Li AAs/AAAs.

If you really need to charge AAs etc and things beyond a few batteries, some solar panels are good, some not. You need something to put the loose batteries in to charge them, some kind of dock, if the supplied plugs with the panel do not plug straight into the device to be charged. I recently had good experience with this one:
http://www.multipoweredproducts.com.au/products/Sunlinq-Plus-Portable-Solar... (It's Aust but I'm sure you have similar in the UK).

In reply to The Lemming:

I'd just buy something like this:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/New-Trent-External-Motorola-Blackberry/dp/B003Y58CV...

Or maybe one of the bigger one for UK hills, you're never away from a plug socket for that long. Instead of hauling all the solar stuff around, just charge that up and then just to charge your devices. It's a lot cheaper than most of the solar chargers as well.

In reply to mattrm:

That looks interesting, have you used one yourself?

In reply to mattrm:

I've took a punt and gone for the 1000 version.

It gets some excellent reviews. If anybody is interested I can report back on my findings.

In reply to The Lemming:

Recommended by a mate, who's usually pretty reliable with his gadget buying. I don't have one myself, but am planning on buying one. But as they're just big batteries, I can't really see how you can go wrong with them.

In reply to mattrm:

You can do all that with Goal Zero and use the solar panel when needed!

In reply to The Lemming:
Really surprised by some peoples experience of power monkeys. I have the powermonkey classic and really impressed by it. Use it when away to charge a phone (HTC smartphone), and has enough charge to go about 1 1/2 charges which is plenty between mains charges.

You can get powermonkeys that have greater capacity, have a look on there website.

In reply to Tom Hutton:

Yes, but the goal zero costs £80 and the one that I suggested costs £22. Personally for use in the UK I reckon that a large battery device is good enough. I wouldn't like to leave a solar panel on my car dashboard when out in the UK, nor on view in my tent. And I can't see myself carrying one. I can see how if you're going aboard/on expedition then a solar panel would be useful.

But YMMV and it's good to hear all the suggestions, I'd never heard of the Goal Zero stuff, it looks good.

Also on the Power Monkey front, I've only ever heard good things about them so surprised to hear people not liking them on here.

In reply to tompilgrem:

Odd, I use one to charge my HTC and barely get one charge from it.

It then takes forever to recharge using the solar panel, and never fully charges the supply either.

I'm persevering with it since it wasn't cheap, but I wouldn't buy another or really recommend it....

Si

In reply to SCC:

Mine never got out of the gate with my Samsung Ace. There was no recognition of anything. However it was able to charge up my MP3 player and £5 mobile phone. But no joy with a smart phone, which was the reason I bought it.