DOKIO 300W 18V Solar Panel Kit Monocrystalline Portable Flexible Folding Include Solar Charge Controller and PV Cable for 12V Battery Charging Camper Van

Folds out, is a little flexible for open shut open shut daily but for camping every few weeks or we used it on a storage unit and is just fine with a battery and inverter

This innocent looking solar system has a major safety issue .There is no information to say that the exposed pin on the cable that plugs into the solar panel is actually positive from your leisure battery.So if you have the solar cable loose in a vehicle plugged into the controller which is in turn connected to your leisure battery and that pin touches any metal you will get a short circuit that will potentially start a fire in your vehicle as the cable melts .. as I found out ! Pics illustrate the issue . I presumed that the exposed pin was the negative . There is no warning about this and the controller says it’s short circuit protected and all necessary protections are installed ! .. well the controller may be but the wire certainly is not . The whole length of the cable both that connects to the leisure battery and to the solar panel is fried .. the positive clamp on the battery connector melted and de soldered itself it was so hot ! If I had been travelling on a motorway when this happened I’m not sure I would still be here to tell the tale .My van filled with smoke in seconds and the fire would have caught on to other items in the van very quickly if I had not been able to act immediately .I’m very disappointed in the safety of this system as it is sold . There should be far more emphasis on telling the consumer this extremely important information .. you cannot use this system with the solar panel cable still connected and loose in a vehicle…it’s extremely dangerous and I’m amazed it’s sold without a safety cap or a stern warning on the product information that the exposed pin on the solar cable is a potential deadly short circuit of it comes into contact with any metal parts in your vehicle . I’m writing this here as I can not find any way of contacting the company that makes it .Further more the performance of the panels themselves drop within weeks of use… in the U.K. it’s hard to find enough opportunities to actually use a solar panel so the fact that performance has dropped by half is absolute rubbish .. do not touch these panels with a barge pole another owner has had exactly the same problem within a few months of usage they are now in his garage un used and replaced with two panels that cost half the price and work far more efficiently … the product is wired up wrong uses bad cheap connectors and is dangerous as well as a total waste of money .. Amazon should have better quality control of who is selling and what is being sold !I’m just writing again to add that I know one other person with the same setup and his findings are exactly the same . He has stopped bothering with these panels and bought two renogy 100 w panels . They deliver exactly what they say . I connected his panels to my my setup and went from the tiny 67 w output of these disappointing dokio panels right up to 150 w immediately . The dokio panels barely give my 70w at best .. and yet they are sold as 300w . A disgraceful product ! And I would like my money refunded .

Dokio adds multiple barrel plugs and a free easy to connect controller

These are a good deal, they do the job. One little problem is that the red binding isn't very strong. So it has frayed where the panel has been resting on the ground.

What agreat product easy to use

Having watched several YouTube reviews of these solar panels I thought I had found just what I was looking for, unfortunately they performed so badly that either of my 120 w panels were able to almost match the output of this 300w panel. The packing looked liked it had been returned previously as it was covered in different tape and old address labels.

Fit for purpose

This is in addition to my review below written several months ago.As you can see from the second photo the 300w Dokio is now in pieces, broken in two and ready for the Garbage bin where it belongs !Output dropped to around 100w. Such appalling construction and cheap materials .... a complete and utter waste of money !I bought two Dokio 160 and a Dokio 300 few months ago to use off grid in our camper .As you see in the photo I have both set up in the garden, one of each size. They are set to the correct vertical angle and aimed directly at the cloudless sun. They were connected to 1. an Ecoflow Delta Max and 2. a Frogbro solar panel meter.The average results results were as follows :-160 watt panel = 85 watts max300 watt panel = 160 watts maxThe two panels were then connected together in parallel and had a combined output of 205 watts.Really did expect much better but having spent around £600 on the three of them I feel that I would have been much better off by paying for a hook-up on campsites.