FWIW:

I purchased two VW solar chargers on E-Bay awhile ago.

Hooked one up to my Westy's cigarette lighter and the other to my '92 Ford
T-bird Super Coupe cigarette lighter (loved that car, have sold it since
though).

I don't know if solar charger charges the Westy's battery but it certainly
does not drain it. The T-Bird, however, had its battery drained completely
dead in less than a week - had to buy a new battery as the old one would not
accept a charge.

I don't know if the solar charger was at fault but I expect that the T-Bird
cigarette lighter socket and solar charger plug did not like working together,
I would check that both are compatible before trying the charger on another
car.

Markus with '87 Westy in Pismo Beach (where it's 72F and sunny today!)

------ Original Message ------
Received: Fri, 17 Dec 2004 01:44:31 AM PST
From: Andrew Grebneff <andrew.grebneff@STONEBOW.OTAGO.AC.NZ>
To: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM
Subject: Re: Solar Battery Chargers

> >I put one of those small dashboard chargers on my camper down at the
> >Gulf before Ivan in september, and things were so messed up I didn't
> >get back until thanksgiving. With no load on the battery it was
> >completely dead. And I was using one with a diode to prevent
> >discharging at night. You better check it out!
> >
> >Jim
> >
> >On Dec 16, 2004, at 2:42 PM, Dave Chameides wrote:
> >
> >>Has anyone ever used one of those solar battery chargers on your vanagon?
> >>I'm going to be having mine sitting for a while and it seemed like a good
> >>idea but I wanted to check and see if anyone had any feedback on them.
> >>
> >>Thanks
> >>
> >>Dave
> 
> I bought a "Green Charger", with an Australian brand name (made in
> China, of course). The first one didn't charge the battery , so I had
> an electronics technician test it at work. It didn't put out enough
> juice to charge a dead cockroach. Nor did the replacement, so I got a
> refund & complained to the "manufacturer"... who did reply and asked
> that I arrange for the seller to hold one of those I'd tried, to be
> picked up and checked out. I did so and have heard nothing further.
> --
> Andrew Grebneff
> Dunedin
> New Zealand
> Fossil preparator
> <andrew.grebneff@stonebow.otago.ac.nz>
> Seashell, Macintosh, VW/Toyota van nut
>