Improved Structure of Solar Tracker with Microcontroller Based Control

Abstract

A new mechanical structure for solar tracker was designed and presented. The structure implements two stepper motors for free rotation on X and Y axis. The rotation is intelligently controlled by a pre-programmed 2K microcontroller device PIC 18F4560 which provides simple programming strategy through C language. The designed algorithm is based on the measurement of intensity of solar radiation which is captured by an ultra violet sensitive device known as Pyranometer. The system has been tested and the results show very significant impact on the mechanical design, controlling algorithm and also the cost of the development.