We just started cruising, left the
dock 10/1. On 9/30 we had to rent a car and replace half of our
solar array (4 x 100 renogy flexible
solar panels on white plastic). My wife found a thread on Facebook about them catching fire, so we contacted Renogy and they said they would replace them.
The
replacements are the same
panels but with a sheet of
aluminum attached to the back. (ie: if you took your panel off, and put a piece of
aluminum 1"-2" smaller on the back, and then reinstalled, that's the fix) Ours looked like they just made them up in the factory for us, the white silicone was still wet when we installed them.
They seem to be fine so far but it's been a whirlwind. We had all these unexpected failures right at the launch, not to mention the
water heater failing last night and taking out the
inverter in the process. I was able to bring the
inverter back from the dead. Anyhow, that's another thread for another day.
Anyhow, just wanted to give you guys a heads up. From what I understand if you have the renogy flexible
panels mounted directly to a surface you should have them replaced. Ours are mounted on our
bimini and when I looked at the bottom I could see heat distortion on some of them. The
bimini is starboard and didn't appear to be damaged.