this post was submitted on 05 Apr 2026
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Electric Vehicles

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Hi, while looking for a good ev for my family, i came across this new KIA van. Its kinda like the VW ID buzz but seems to have more space. When I saw the wide roof I thought, why not but some solar on top? And with some rough calculation I came up with the following. 3 600w/800w panels which generate roughly 15km of range on an average eu day, would fit on top. This would be perfect for my regular driving needs. Has anyone ever tried to add solar to an ev and has anyone experience with this car?

Just looking for general advice on feasibility of solar mods and the car itself.

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[–] Mangoholic@lemmy.ml 1 points 2 weeks ago

Thanks for all the feedback. I should probably clear some things up tho. First, I do not expect charging while driving. Second, I do not drive a lot in general maybe 30km a week. So it really just has to generate this amount for me to never bother to charge.

The aero dynamics had me worried as well, but I do not have the expertise to access this, but if you look at bikes on a car roof, it can't be that bad, right?

Aren't there solar panels that work better in bad angles? Also could one not make some mechanical setup to angle them up while parked?

I did not account for the input having to be a specific type tho. I thought you just have some battery for camping anyway. And you charge that from solar and this plugs into the regular charge input. Avoiding modifing any crazy electric tech of the car.

If I modify the car, I would do that in the interior anyways for a kitchen or bed etc.

Its not so much about recouping costs and more about the convience of waiting and getting km to drive. So it is for a nice camping van setup that also solves my regular car needs.

I do have some balcony solar and it works great, highly recommend. But its still rent and I cannot charge a car from my apartment.