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by zatel 2195 days ago
I worked in the Tesla factory making solar panels and I can attest that they are more snazzy and lighter then normal panels I've bought for my home (the wait list was to long for Tesla ones) I'm not sure they're much more durable.

They can take a hit straight on but if anything comes at the wrong angle the top glass layer shatters. It was so common that we had a designated spot to go dump the ones that would frequently break during the manufacturing process.

2 comments

I have ~8yr old panels manufactured in China, one of them was shattered by what I suspect was a falling bullet (must've been a wild party...). Since the panels are wired in series, that reduced the output of the system by about half (the shattered panel was in the middle). Ironically I couldn't easily replace it, as new panels are higher output, so I would have to replace my inverter. I opted to just bypass the dead panel and have 19 working instead of 20.
> They can take a hit straight on but if anything comes at the wrong angle the top glass layer shatters.

hopefully the cybertruck and the panels will get better in future revs. :)