Solar Power DIY Blog

One day I had a bright idea. Some people would cringe at this, but I had an old welder that was given to me some time ago. It still welds and I use it from time to time for just that. I had inherited some high-powered diodes, in fact they had already in two heat sinks. They were actually used as an external rectifier for a direct charging alternator. Well I took these and rewired them. There were six diodes for three phases but I only needed four. I used them as a full wave rectifier bridge rectifier and then connected that to the welder. I checked the voltage before hand to make sure that it wasn’t too high and then connected the output to the batteries. I’ve got it charging about thirty-five to forty amps. At the moment I am using it to charge at the rate of twenty-five amps, running off a generator.

Not a very efficient charger, I am sure. But it’s working for me at the moment.