Night Star PV Powered Marine Grade Lighting System The Night Star is designed to offer our customers a high quality, low cost, low maintenance, warning and navigation lighting solutions for bridges, pilings, waterway markers, marina and harbor entrances, etc... Some are in use by the US Army as firing range boundary markers, others at the Hoover Dam to warn boats off of the log boom barrier. The Night Star is the right choice anywhere you need a dependable flashing or steady ON marker light. This lighting system comes complete with a Sealed Gel Battery, Gray PVC Water and Corrosion Proof NEMA IV Enclosure, Uni-solar’s 6V Unbreakable triple junction PV panel, PV mounting bracket, Fully potted Flexcharge NC2L2 Charge-Load Controller, and high power solid state lamps which are visible up to 2 Miles. The system is completely assembled and ready to use right out of the box. Simply mount the unit where it will be exposed more than 5 hours of non shaded overhead and southern sky, and plug in the battery. The Night Star will survive repeated temporary submersion.

Low Maintenance Design
The only maintenance required for the Night Star is to ensure that the PV panel is not encrusted with foreign matter (dust is usually OK) and to change the inexpensive Gel battery every 2.5 to 5 years (typically every 3 years). (Hot Temperatures will reduce the life span of all lead acid and gel type batteries). White incandescent lamp units require a bulb change only once a year to prevent down time. The PV panel is designed for 20 years of operation and the Solid State lamps are rated for 100,000 hours of illumination time, that's 243 years of lamp operation for units operating at the 4 second flash rate.

High Reliability
We have seen many small lighting system designs that will work well until the seasons change to winter. This is where the quality design of the Night Star will shine through.

For a PV powered lighting system to function dependably in high earth latitudes, 48° North/South for example, the system must be designed to operate with only 1/3 of a "Full Sun Hour". An entire day of Northern overcast December sky, it is approximately equal to 0.6 to 1 full sun hour of Bright Overhead Summer Sun.  0.6 sun hours of full sun photon energy is twice what is required to indefinitely sustain the Night Star's power needs. In the event that the PV panel was covered with snow, the battery has enough capacity to operate for 4 nights before disconnecting the lamp to protect the battery from over discharge. On the next day the system will recover with the equivalent of only 1 full sun hour. These are the conditions where controller and system efficiencies are critical for proper system operation, and why high efficiency Flexcharge Controllers are the controller of choice for large and small alternative energy systems.

Lamp Colors Available:
 

Solid State Colors: Navigation Red Navigation Blue/Green Yellow Orange Blue And Now  Solid State White Incandescent Colors:  White (Flashing Only).

( " * " Recommended for use in Latitudes 48° to 55° North, or South)

Flash Rates Available:
Standard Unit 3.7 Sec OFF 0.3 Sec. ON (Popular USCG Marine Buoy Flash Rate) *
Special Order Flash Rates:

0.5 Sec. OFF 0.5 Sec. ON
1.0 Sec. OFF 1.0 Sec. ON
0.9 Sec OFF 0.1 Sec ON *
3.7 Sec OFF 0.1 Sec. ON *