When all Else Fails - Read the Instructions!
A bit over ten years ago I bought two ‘Sunnan’ solar powered lights from Ikea. Sunnan solar lights had a lot going for them, they were cheap, portable and reasonably effective if you are after task lighting rather than trying to illuminate a whole room. They have a battery/solar panel integrated pack which can be removed from the light so you can sit it in the sun for charging. I even made a charging frame so I could set the panels up at the right angle. (check here). Unfortunately, they seem to be no longer available, but we still have our two.
They saw quite a bit of service at our place and some of our friends had them too. Over the years they did not seem to work as well, not holding a charge as long and were eventually relegated to cupboards containing stuff we no longer use. They remained there until recently.
I did wonder if I could breathe new life into them somehow, but if you look at the front of the solar panel module, the solar panels are fixed in place by resin or epoxy or something. Definitely not removable.
Anyway, one of the strange things about cleaning up is that you find things that you forgot/didn’t know you had. I was rationalising a part of my library (pottery, if you are interested) and when I pulled the pottery books out, down behind them was the instruction pamphlet for the Sunnan solar light!
On a quick peruse, the pamphlet states that “After approximately two years, the rechargeable batteries need to be replaced when the lamp doesn’t light up after charging outside in the sun. Replace with rechargeable 1.2V HR6/AA type batteries. SAVE THESE INSTRUCTIONS FOR FUTURE USE.” In thirty different languages. There was also a diagram showing how you can take the BACK of the solar panel unit off and replace the batteries! Oops, missed that!
Challenge accepted!
I removed the solar panel/battery unit from one of the lights and pulled the back off. Sure enough there were three rechargeable batteries, they were not corroded, but clearly dead. I bought some new ones and replaced them in the solar panel unit of the first light, screwed everything back together, reinstalled the unit into the light, switched it on and…….. nothing! This was a surprise to me because the packaging on the batteries stated that the batteries were partially charged so they could work straight away. I have come across issues like this with old batteries, so I pulled everything apart, removed the batteries and wiped over the battery connections in the unit with a coarse cloth to remove any buildup of oxidation, even though there was not much visible.
I put it back together, turned it on and…….it worked!
I repeated the procedure with the second Sunnan and all of a sudden, we had two working solar lights that mere hours before had been only decorative!
How long they will last, I don’t know, but they are working well now! If I had not found and read the instructions it is highly likely they would have been discarded as rubbish at some time but now they will be used into the future.
So, when all else fails, read the instructions!
