How Solar Panels Are Made: A Step-by-Step Guide to High-Quality Solar Energy Production

Nowadays, environmentally friendly resources are always more preferable. Solar energy is such a popular green energy source that is used widely.

That said, have you wonder how a solar panel is made? What materials do you need to make a high quality solar panel for your product that will eventually save you more money? This post has the answers for you.

1. What is solar panel

Solar panels (also known as solar cell modules) are assembled by several solar cells, which are the core parts of the solar power generation system and the most important part of the solar power generation system.

2. Materials required

• Tempered glass: It protects the main body of the power generators (batteries), therefore the tempered glass need to have a high quality of transparency and performance.
• EVA（Ethylene Vinyl Acetate）: It connects the tempered glass and the power generators. As a layer of the solar panel, the quality of EVA is very important and it will affect the service life of the solar panel.
• Battery: There are two main types of power generations: one is crystalline silicon solar cells, another one is thin film solar cells. Both have their  advantages and disadvantages:
  

  	Crystalline silicon solar cells	Thin film solar cells
  Equipment cost	Low	High
  Consumption cost	High	Low
  Conversion efficiency	Low	High
  At low lighting environment	Poor performance	Good performance

• Backplane: Need to be sealing, insulative, waterproof and aging-resistant.
• Aluminum alloy: Designed as a frame to protect and support the generator layers.

• Welding junction box: It protects the whole power generator system cell from other cells.
• Glue: It fills the gaps between the tempered glasses and batteries. Highly recommend using silicone as a binder. it’s easy to operate and low cost.

3. Machine required

Most of the factories have fully automated equipment that can produce many different sizes for different situations.

4. Three main steps to manufacture the solar panel

4.1  Get the conductive glass ready

• Put titanium dioxide powder and binder slowly coated on the tempered glass burn up and then cool down;
• Coloring the titanium dioxide with dark purple dye. If the film is unevenly colored on both sides, it can be soaked for 5 minutes, then rinsed with ethanol and lightly dried since tempered glass is quite expensive;
• Put the electrolyte between two conductive glass.

4.2 Combine batteries and glasses

• Connect the batteries with a copper strip to obtain more power;
• Then seal the batteries, isolated from the air. Otherwise, it will gradually decay until the power generation is zero. Then use tempered glass, EVA and backing plate. After heating and vacuuming, the battery piece can be sealed between the glass and the back plate;
• Put the aluminum frame around the combine component to protect it, especially in the corners.

4.3 Assemble all the components

• Battery testing: Classify the performance parameters of the battery, so that it effectively combines different batteries;
• Front welding: The bus bar is welded to the front of the battery (negative electrode) on the main grid line, the bus bar is a tinned copper strip, we use the welding machine can weld the strip in the form of multiple points on the main grid on-line;
• Backside series connecting:  It’s based on different solar panels using different templates so that the size of the back soldering groove corresponds to the size of the battery, fully integrated;
• Laminating laying, component lamination, edge trimming, framing;
• Connecting with welding junction box: Weld a box at the back of the assembly to facilitate connection to other equipment;
• Component testing: Determine the output power of the battery, test its output characteristics, so that the quality level of the solar panel can be displayed.

Conclusion

The solar panel industry is quite mature in China. So it’s not uncommon that many companies would choose to have the solar panel, or even the whole product, made in China. Challenge it may seem at the beginning, you’ll be rewarded much more when you land on a committed, trustworthy manufacturer.

Should you have any question regarding solar panel, be it finding an ideal manufacturer, or running quality control over the manufacturing process, feel free to reach out to Insight Solutions Global. We’d be glad to help you out.