Solar Skillet

We know that if you take a parabolic dish with a shiny reflective surface it will focus the sun into a single point that is hot enough to catch paper, cardboard and even wood on fire.

Well I have taken this principle of focusing the sun ray's to heat the bottom of a pan to create what I call "The Solar Skillet."

Almost all materials are recycled and can be got for free. The only cost to the project was the spray on adhesive and the Mylar blanket (total approx.cost $8) if you use recycled chip bags cost of project about $6.

Once built you will be able to fry up pretty much anything, as long as there is ample sun light.

What you will need:

1) Old satellite dish

2) Mylar Emergency Blanket or recycled clean chip bags (Mylar)

3) Spray on adhesive

4) 3 old tent poles

5) String or rope

6) metal pan or cake tin

7) Black spray paint

Now we are going to glue a Mylar emergency blanket to the satellite dish.

1) remove any extra parts from the dish. leaving only the dish itself.

2) clean the satellite dish removing any dirt

3) spray on spray adhesive directly onto the dish

4) apply Mylar blanket to the dish making sure you put it on tight and as smooth as you can.

5) trim off any excess Mylar that is hanging off the edge of the dish.

1) make sure you metal pan is clean on the bottom then spray paint the bottom with black high heat tolerant spray paint. The type of paint used on car engine parts or BBQ's.

2) drill 1/8 - 3/16 holes in each of the four corners or if you use a round pan 4 holes evenly space around.

3) string rope through each of the holes approx 16" in length and tying the knot in one end of the rope.

1) Get three old tent poles that are the same length.

2) tie them together where they meet to form the tripod.

3) set solar dish directly under the tripod angled towards the sun.

With the dish set under the tripod, take your spray painted pan and attache it to the tripod with the string that is attached to it.

Position the pan at the optimal focal point focused on the bottom of the pan to get greatest amount of the suns ray focused on the center of the pan.

An egg should only take about 5 mins to cook. Once cooked remove egg and eat.

Pretty cool and tasted great.