Spotlight Cam Battery not charging with solar panel

Add me to the list. Purchased the solar panel and spotlight cam under a year ago. I saw an email today that the battery level is 4% and needs recharged. I’ve cleaned the panel and checked connections. After seeing this thread I’m not as confident a simple cleaning is the solution.

I purchased both from ring and assume they are under warranty. I’ll see if they charge today at all, if not I’ll look into a warranty claim I guess?

I’m on iOS and have the “established” under solar status as well, nothing showing it is charging though.

Add me to the list of frustrated Spotlight Cam Battery users. I bought an additional camera and solar panel in July and everything seemed fine for a bit. However, in the past two weeks, I saw that the batteries were sitting at 3% and 5% and I am seeing Solar Status “Not Established”. Cautiously climbed a ladder today and checked connection, then removed batteries which are now charging in my house. Called CS yesterday, and after a few minutes of the usual temperatures, debris, and sunlight warnings (I am on the sunny mid-CA coast!), they wanted the serial number of the camera and solar panel! Of course, they are not easy to see while mounted, and I am not able to take them down myself. This is the newest of four Spotlight Cams (three with solar panels) and the others with Solar Panels are working like a charm! I have an Android phone…anybody with updates? Had the Geek Squad install it originally…

Add me the list. I’ve done it all to troubleshoot to include replacing both camera and panel. I bought 6 stick up cams but only installed 2 when I noticed the lack of charging. All items are being boxed up and returned to Amazon today.

Yeah, both our cameras are being stupid again as well, after several months of good operation. Within a day, both cameras had drained down to low battery mode.

It’s like they don’t have QA testers in their software division.

APP FEATURE UPDATE NEEDED: ADD A THIRD POWER SOURCE OPTION: SOLAR

how this is not already within the app is a head scratcher

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My issue is that when setting up the camera and solar within the app there should be a third option for POWER SOURCE type. Outlet, Battery and Solar.

When you have the camera connected to the solar panel the app tries to get you to change the power source to outlet. Well, if you setup your solar connected camera to Power Source: Outlet, the motion and record option will drain the battery to 0% in no time and will not recharge with the soal panel once the battery is at 0% UPDATE: Beaming sunny day. App showed Power Source: Battery, 0% and would not pull up Live View. I went outside to solar stick up camera and waved my arm to set off motion detection, went back into app and the Power Souce updated showing Power Outlet, battery level 1%.

APP FEATURE UPDATE NEEDED: ADD A THIRD POWER SOURCE OPTION: SOLAR

When using the Solar Power Source option have the default camera motion and record settings set to higher sensitivity during the day while charging/running on solar and have those options change to Power Source: Battery at night.

Hard to believe the amount of basic needed features that are taking years to implement or never being implemented. (Example: Ring Alarm Gen2 Keypad - No option for constant LED illumintaion.)

What good is a solar panel that isn’t even recognized by the attached camera? Don’t tell me to clean it or reconnect it - I wouldn’t be writing this if I hadn’t already tried that and everything else. This product is a failure.

And why is this community forum just full of problems with no solutions?

Where is the customer support?

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The cam and solar panel have been installed and reporting with the same settings for close to a year.

Last month for the first time the app reported the batteery was at 35% and required charging. I removed the battery and charged it to 100%.

While it was charging I relocated the cam and solar panel thinking maybe it wasn’t getting enough sun. I moved it to where it now gets approximately 6 hours of almost direct sun each day.

Yesterday I received another alert telling me the cam battery is at 30%. Today it is at 23%. I’m thinking either the battery is failing or the solar panel it not charging the battery.

Any ideas?

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If you subscibe to Ring Protect Plus Plan where your recordings are stored for 1 year then all devices on your plan have a lifetime warranty until you unsubscribe.

Just an update for me. Contacted ring and discussed my issue. They were able to go back and look at my battery levels since I initially added the solar with spotlight cam. It showed my battery was still charging, but less charge per day than you would expect to get daily on average.

There were several days recently that it captured a whole lot of motion And caused the battery to drain more than usual. The trickle charge from the panel was not able to recover enough charge to get back to 100%.

I updated the sensitivity on mine to be a little less sensitive, it was at max sensitivity. I also charged the battery back to 100% before reinstalling it.

It’s been a week and I just looked, battery is at 99% with a heavy rain and clouds all day so far.

I’m not sure if the seasons changing and the earths position to the sun have anything to do with it, but it does seem like the location of my panel is getting a little less sun than it did this summer when I put it up. This could possibly be why it’s not charging quite as much throughout the day as it normally would. I plan to relocate my panel to see if that helps any as well. As of now I’m good to go again for the time being.

I have 4 solar panels, first one stoped charging so I plugged it into power, now a second stopped charging another camera

Second solar panel stopped charging, cleaned panel adjusted cord, replaced batteries with new fully charged batteries, this is a pain

Not sure what the point of the solar panel is when the stick up camera battery seems to totally drain using it. Purchased 8/20, installed 10/20, the battery was fully charged and needed be recharged two-weeks later. This is less than ideal, to say the least.

The doorbell is wired and works fine, though there are some black out issues and times when it is slow to go live.

just got off the phone with Ring Support. she had me factory reset the camera and ensure the camera was in battery mode vs wired during the setup. she said for some reason when its set to wired with the solar panel, it’ll drain the battery and not charge it. everything looked good on her end, so heres to having a full battery still at night time.

Well I had the battery draining issue all winter and guess it starts again…side camera (2 batteries installed and have sola panel) already drained other ones on the side and backyard draining also…I refuse to have my hubby go every week and change batteries again…may just cut my loss with “The Ring” and get regular cameras…idk why Ring can’t get their stuff together with the battery issue during colder days and it actually only got cold yesterday

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Well mine was good there for a couple weeks. Today I am back down to 37%. I did notice the app had some new wording in it for the solar status. Mine now says “connected, but sunlight is too weak to charge this device”. It usually gets sun around noon to 5, so I am going to check it again this afternoon. I may try and relocate the panel and see if that helps.

does anyone know if the spotlight cam is shut down will the solar panel still charge the batter please advise

Are you able to check the DC voltage coming at the end of the solar panel cable with a multimeter? You should see about 5V DC.

Are you able to check the DC voltage coming out of the end of the solar panel cable with a multimeter? You should see about 5V DC.

yes there is 5volts and now it is charging ever since daylight savings time i was having some problems here in new your so when it is cloudy and i am home i turn off the motion and notification and trun it back in at night it’s working better and don’t have to charge the battery as much

I have a question, if a person has a smart meter with is digital will that go back if you try to feed the main grid???