How Solar Panel Cleaning tractors help small and big farms make efficient
Solar Panel Cleaning Tractor
The Solar Panel Cleaning tractors are where the cleaning system is mounted on a tractor. The entire system can be externally mountable.
The Cleaning system contains the following parts
- Brush System
- Water System
- Hydraulic System
Img 1: Next Automation Solar Track Cleaning Solar Panels
- Brush System
The Brush System is used to clean the solar panels more efficiently while passing the panels in the tractor. The brush system is rotatable which is working on the hydraulic energy.
The brush made up of soft bristles specially made for cleaning the solar panels. The brush is structured on spiral shape which is more efficient for the cleaning purpose than the normal round shaped brushes.
The Brush system is freely pivoted to the edge of the boom. Due to the pivoting movement it can be self-adjustable with panel’s inclination. Also the pivoting movement avoids the load variation on the solar panels during the cleaning process.
The brush length can be changeable based on the panel’s arrangement. With this brush system we can clean the solar panel’s entire length easily.
| Panel Arrangement | Panel Width | Brush Length |
| Single Portrait | 6.5 Feet | 10 Feet |
| Double Portrait | 13 Feet | 15 Feet |
| Triple Portrait | 19.5 Feet | 22 Feet |
| Four Portrait | 26 Feet | 28 Feet |
| Double Landscape | 6.5 Feet | 10 Feet |
| Four Landscape | 13 Feet | 15 Feet |
| Six Landscape | 19.5 Feet | 22 Feet |
| Eight Landscape | 26 Feet | 28 Feet |
| *Assuming 6.5’x3.25’ panels |
- Water System
The Water system used to supply the water required for the cleaning purpose.
The water system contains a water storage tank to carry the water with the tractor itself. The sprinkler system is placed near the rotating brush. During the cleaning operation the water will be sprayed on the surface of the panels with this sprinkler system.
The wet cleaning gives more efficient cleaning than dry cleaning methods because the sticky particles, bird droppings cannot be cleaned with the dry cleaning methods.
The water system used to achieve the efficient wet cleaning required to improve the productivity of the panels.
- Hydraulic System
The Hydraulic system is used to control the entire operation, movement, rotation of the cleaning system.
The Hydraulic system having an oil storage tank which supplies the fluid required to produce the hydraulic energy for various operations.
The hydraulic system is more efficient and easy to operate system than the other mechanism. The precision movements can be possible with the hydraulic system.
With the hydraulic system the cleaning systems swivel mechanism, brush rotation, cleaning height adjustment for various inclinations of panels are controlled.
How solar panel cleaning tractor helps small farms
Commonly Solar farms below 5MW are considered as small farms. The common problems faced by small solar farms while cleaning are
- Dust, Sand Suppression
- Sticky Particles, Bird Droppings
- Space between the arrays
- Number of persons required
- Water usage
The Solar panel cleaning tractor is most effective solution to overcome the above problems faced by the small solar farms.
- The small solar farms are mostly located near the road, middle of the houses, separated on a deserted area. The Pollution caused by the vehicles, peoples, and sand segmentation due to the deserted region are fading on the panels. To clean the Dust, sand, pollution particles faded on the panel we can use the solar panel cleaning tractor on dry cleaning method.
- The bird dropping are easily stickled up to the panel’s surface which affects the panel’s performance. To clean the sticky particles the wet cleaning of the solar panel cleaning tractor is more effective.
- Due to farm a particular sized plant on a small area we need to decrease the array space and height based on the requirement and solar ray availability angles. The tractor are available on various widths so we can mount the cleaning system on any type of small to big tractor based on the availability of space between the arrays to clean the solar panels.
- For the conventional cleaning method we need more human source. Also the efficiency will vary with person to person. The solar panel cleaning tractor need only one person to control the entire operation and vehicle movement. One can perform more efficient than the conventional cleaning method with the solar panel cleaning tractor.
- In the conventional method a large amount of money spent on the water usage for cleaning the panels. Also amount of water used in conventional method is high. The water usage by the solar panel cleaning tractor is less than the conventional manual cleaning methods.
How solar panel cleaning tractor helps big farms
The solar farms above 5MW are known as big solar farms. The Common problems faced by the big solar farms are
- Dust, Sand Suppression
- Sticky Particles, Bird Droppings
- Inclination of the Array
- Length of the solar panels
- Number of persons required
- Water Usage
- Cycle Time
The Solar panel cleaning tractor can be a better solution for the above problems than the other cleaning methods.
- The large solar farms are mostly planted on the deserted areas. The sand, dust suppression on the panel is high. The Solar panel cleaning tractor can easily clean these particles in dry cleaning and wet cleaning methods.
- Due to the large surface area bird dropping, sticky particles can easily stickle with the solar panels. The Solar panels cleaning tractors wet cleaning method can easily clean sticky particles and bird droppings.
- The inclination of the array on big farms may vary with array to array based on the plant surface and solar rays position. This gives a challenge on cleaning the panels the solar panel cleaning tractor is with a pivoting brush system. It can be easily adoptable with all type of inclinations.
- The Length of the solar panels will be high on big farms. In the Conventional method one cannot cover the entire length easily. In solar panel cleaning tractor we can use various brush lengths based on requirement. The solar panel cleaning tractor can easily cover the entire length of the panel.
- In conventional method we need 6 to 20 persons to clean a plant. While using the solar panel cleaning tractor we need only one person for each tractor.
- In the conventional method we use more water to clean the sticky particle and to clean the top surfaces of the panels. But in the solar panel cleaning tractor we use less water than the conventional method. The water requirement is equal on all panel heights.
- Due to the large size of the farm we need to clean the farm daily basis to improve the productivity. Even though it took much cyclic time to clean the entire plant. To overcome this the solar panel cleaning tractor is a better solution than any other cleaning methods.