Sentinel®
Lighting System
SolarKing’s patented Sentinel® lighting system was designed to provide large-area lighting for parks, playgrounds, courts, parking lots and street-lighting applications. The aesthetically-pleasing one-piece thermoformed-housing sets the system apart from the competition and provides superior performance, reliability, and value. All of the essential components are contained and protected by the housing at the top of the pole while the battery is buried underground in SolarKing’s patented underground battery enclosure. These systems have been installed all around the Valley of the Sun and Southwest and are typically installed with the lights at 16’ above grade and configured to operate year-round on a dusk-to-dawn basis.
System Components
- Solar-module – 140-watt
- Typical installation height is with the lights about 16’ above grade
- Morningstar Sunlight 10L system controller
- Battery – 100AH sealed-lead-acid (SLA) battery typically buried underground in SolarKing’s patented underground battery container
- Each system has two 72-LED light bricks which can be aimed up/down/around for maximum effectiveness
- 4” square-steel tubing pole is powder-coated and the base is taped for rust-resistance and durability
How does it work?
The patented Sentinel® lighting system has been designed so that is it aesthetically pleasing and so that the thermoformed housing protects the solar-module and other components in such a way that vandalism or theft of components is virtually eliminated. Another unique feature of the Sentinel® lighting system is that the system has two (2) LED light bricks and each light-brick can be aimed from shining straight-down to straight-out and each light-brick can be rotated 360-degrees. This flexibility in aiming the light-bricks allows the lighting to be aimed where it’s wanted and away from where it’s not wanted and provides a much more usable light-spread than typical systems which just shine straight-down.
The Sentinel® lighting system housing assembly is typically installed on a 4”x4” steel-tube pole by a slip-in stub which bolted through the pole. This arrangement has enabled customers to save money by using their existing poles of this size if the lighting is converted from 110VAC to solar-powered lighting (in 2011 we completed a 37 street-light retrofit project in a Phoenix community and used the existing poles which significantly reduced the cost of the project).
Theft of batteries is a serious problem for any large solar-powered lighting system and placing a large, heavy battery (approximately 70 pounds) on the top of a pole is not generally a good idea. Several years ago SolarKing developed an innovative solution for solar-powered lighting systems that use large batteries (typically Group 27 maintenance-free batteries). SolarKing has been awarded a utility patent for its Underground Battery Container System (UBC) from the US Patent and Trademark Office (Patent #8,096,439 issued 1/17/12). The UBC creates a small air-pocket over/around the battery which protects the battery connections from short-circuiting even if the UBC is completely underwater (as in a flood-retention basin or irrigation basin) since the water-level cannot rise to the top of the battery. SolarKing’s patented system is typically installed with the batteries about 6” below grade, but the top of the container can also be at grade with the cover secured by tamper-resistant bolts. Placing the battery underground significantly extends the life of the battery since it is in a relatively cool, constant-temperature environment, and it greatly reduces the likelihood of theft since there aren’t any surface markings to indicate the location of the battery (we do take pictures of the battery locations and provide the pictures to the customer).
