Imagine our delight when we spotted this Kevin Kelly sculpture at the Dumbo Arts Festival about 100 yards from our offices. We saw the tell-tale design of our 16 Watt solar panels about a block away and...
It is now remarkably easy to build your own solar backpack with one of our small solar panels. We chose this classic and sublimely simple Orange Superbreak backpack from Jansport on Amazon. To make it, you...
Corby Hicks, our friend over at Verdantly, recently completed an interesting energy-efficient home-improvement project - installing a solar-powered crawl space ventilation system. Even better, he detailed the...
An avid hiker and photographer from Australia built his own custom solar laptop charger using our 3.4 Watt panels and V60 (now the V72) battery. His solution was designed to be both light and waterproof. Find...
We recently came across the the Solar Stella, a project by John Wilson in which he upgrades his Stella Amp to run off of solar power. We were particularly interested because he uses a Voltaic...
There are times when you may find that you want to expand the power producing capabilities of your solar setup. This post will cover the basics of how to determine if you can combine power sources, and how to...
We love it when customers use our panels to design a system that fits their needs. A Dutch customer recently mod-ed his Ortlieb handlebar bag. He wanted a removable and waterproof system. We like the detailed...
For those of you who don't already know about the FM3 Buddha Machine, here's the scoop: The Buddha Machine is a small plastic box that plays meditative music composed by Christiaan Virant and Zhang Jian....
You know it is going to be a good day at work when you get a solar-powered Lego Car in the mail. The folks at Play-Well sent it to us after choosing to use our panels for this project (if you have children,...
Here's a guide to building a USB powered LED lamp compatible with Voltaic Systems products. This is a quick and easy way to convert the solar energy we’ve stored in our Voltaic Systems batteries into...
It took a bit too long to setup our first home solar charging station, so we made a number of changes in version 2. This one took us less than ten minutes and is a much cleaner implementation. Like the first...
Voltaic Systems employee, Phillip Stearns will be teaching a 2-day class in DIY Renewable Electricity at 3rd Ward in Brooklyn, NY. Students will learn how to charge AA batteries using our 2-Watt solar...
Our products are built to be highly portable, but we're not always traveling -- so how do you get the most out of a small solar power system? I wanted something that was as convenient as plugging into the wall...
A while back we covered the nifty Sunnan solar powered desk lamp from IKEA, highlighting its usefulness while making note of some of the things we would like to change. In that list of possible improvements...
EEWeb recently interviewed a few of us here at Voltaic. You can read the full interview here to learn more about what we're working on, what keeps us up at night and our favorite hardware tools. The picture...
As we prep to get our solar MacBook chargers back in stock, we got together in our Brooklyn conference room to make some MagSafe adapters. They are not works of art, but they are functional. We splice used...
Hurricane Irene is coming! Here in the NYC area, the crazy rush for last minute supplies has depleted stores of “D” and “C” cell batteries commonly used in portable radios and flashlights. In...
Here's a quick video tour of our Switchable Circuit Boxes. It starts out a bit out of focus, but settles in after a few seconds. We use the circuit boxes inside our products. They also allow DIYers to combine...
