USB charger on kayak

I've been using my Wilderness Systems lithium battery to charge my phone while sitting on the couch at home. The multiple usb ports are pretty convenient. Just a thought...

So the wall charger charges the lithium battery which charges your phone? Very Rube Goldberg.

You could get a solar panel and charge the battery that way, then charge the phone with the battery.  NowhereMan does not appear to plan on bringing his couch or wall outlet with him on multiday trips so that might actually work for him.

I don't have a 10-foot cord for my phone charger... 
But I have a handful of those small portable power banks...and one day realized my WS battery is like a giant portable power bank haha. I may even add it to our earthquake emergency kit

You could get a solar panel and charge the battery that way, then charge the phone with the battery.  NowhereMan does not appear to plan on bringing his couch or wall outlet with him on multiday trips so that might actually work for him.

I do have a 7W "PowerFilm" solar panel that I plan to use. So, my next question is, do I need 2 batteries, 1 to use and 1 to charge, or is there any easy and reliable way to manage the charging and usage (for FF and, hopefully, iPhone) with a single battery?

You could get a solar panel and charge the battery that way, then charge the phone with the battery.  NowhereMan does not appear to plan on bringing his couch or wall outlet with him on multiday trips so that might actually work for him.

I do have a 7W "PowerFilm" solar panel that I plan to use. So, my next question is, do I need 2 batteries, 1 to use and 1 to charge, or is there any easy and reliable way to manage the charging and usage (for FF and, hopefully, iPhone) with a single battery?

I use two batteries. You could put the dry box with two cables running out in parallel, one for the FF and one for the panel and everything separately fused, I think that would work fine as long as your panel can handle salt water exposure, which I know nothing about either way. Never really occurred to me.

Salt water is no tango for those USB connectors, just asking for trouble. 


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This link looks to have a lot of good info on using solar on a kayak. Prolly going to do something pretty similar to this...

https://www.kayakfishingnz.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=14541

This guy put a solar panel inside his kayak (same brand and color as mine, coincidentally). Looks like it'll generate 12W inside, as opposed to 16W outside in direct sun.

  I have these components already to add to a one of the wally- mart water proof orange dry boxes.  Haven't made decision as to where I plan to add install the little digital DVM/USB though, in the hull opposite my compass install or in the battery box itself.  I'm leaning to in the hull as it'll be visible and useable.  In the battery box, not so much.  I have a few RED LED strips I plan to install for either or both, deck and in hull for now and wire my compass backlight in the circuit as well.
  Don't have a switch for the compass yet.  The one I do have is RED and not sure if it'll be a Main power Enabling the battery box) or for the deck/ in hull LED (TBD) so I'll need to order another switch for the compass light and  maybe the deck lights?
   Decisions....
  I do like the little DVM/ dual USB charger display, I may have to get one for my truck! (Green)
 (All available on Amazon)

I've got the wires installed in my batter box and should have it all connected up for a test run fairly soon. The only thing I can't decide is where to put the solar panel---might have to experiment with a few different locations to see what'll actually work best. I'll post some picture eventually...

Just a heads up but the solar panels on power banks are pretty useless. I bought one with such an inefficient panel that it would have taken 40 hours to fully charge the battery.

Just a heads up but the solar panels on power banks are pretty useless. I bought one with such an inefficient panel that it would have taken 40 hours to fully charge the battery.

It seems that the claimed output from a lot of those small solar panels is grossly exaggerated. The “solarfilm” brand that I’ve got gets good reviews and many even state that it will exceed the wattage rating. Even so, the 7W that I’ve got is pretty minimal, but has been fun to experiment with. If it turns out to be helpful, I’ll probably upgrade to about 20W.