Solar Power: Research, Google, and Choices

In the first week of my internship at Penn's Kod*Lab, I've met many new people, real engineers, and seen both the X-Rhex and XRL robots in action. I've also learned about five weeks of MEAM101, Penn's intro to Solidworks, CADing, and mechanical design course, in five days from the indefatigable Mike Choi (www.mikchoy.com). 

Though I'll be working on projects from that course, as well as projects for the lab itself, he suggested I put my new CADing skills to use in creating my own personal project. Drawing on his "Mini3" headphone amp for inspiration, I've decided to make a USB solar charger! Though I started with several highly ambitious, complicated, and over-engineering ideas (using several modular battery packs in series, each with its own solar panel), I decided to keep it simple for now and use the "Altoids Tin Solar iPhone charger" design that's now so popular. 

                                     

There are tons of different designs online, but I went with Brown Dog Gadget's Heavy Duty Lithium Solar USB kit. Lithium batteries "provide a higher sustained voltage and a larger capacity when compared to AA NiMh batteries," explains the site, and I want to be able to use this charger for many years, even as our technology becomes more advanced and power hungry.  

The plan is to order the kit, which will require some basic soldering, and construct my own enclosure for it out of laser-cut acrylic rather than use the typical Altoids tin. 

Should be simple, right?