I haven’t removed the chunk of hull from the trailer yet. Half the holes are drilled, but I’m not committed to anything. If I left it in place, I could have four stacks of seven cells. That would work fine; it’s just two rovers’ worth of what I did for the trip to Pathfinder.

Problem is I need that opening. The regulator has to be in the pressurized area and it’s too big to fit in the unmodified rover. Plus which, the oxygenator needs to be in a pressurized area while operating. I’ll only need it every five sols, but what would I do on that sol? No, the hole has to be there.

As it is, I’ll be able to stow twenty-one panels. I need homes for the other seven. There’s only one place they can go: the sides of the rover and trailer.

One of my earlier modifications was “saddlebags” draped over the rover. One side held the extra battery (stolen from what is now the trailer), while the other side was full of rocks as counterweight.

I won’t need the bags this time around. I can return the second battery to the trailer from whence it came. In fact, it’ll save me the hassle of the mid-drive EVA I had to do every day to swap cables. When the rovers are linked up, they share resources, including electricity.

I went ahead and reinstalled the trailer’s battery. It took me two hours, but it’s out of the way now. I removed the saddlebags and set them aside. They may be handy down the line. If I’ve learned one thing from my stay at Club Mars, it’s that everything can be useful.

I had liberated the sides of the rover and the trailer. After staring at them for a while, I had my solution.

I’ll make L-brackets that stick out from the undercarriages, with the hooks facing up. Two brackets per side to make a shelf. I can set panels on the shelves and lean them against the rover. Then I’ll lash them to the hull with homemade rope.

There’ll be four “shelves” total; two on the rover and two on the trailer. If the brackets stick out far enough to accommodate two panels, I could store eight additional panels that way. That would give me one more panel than I’d even planned for.

I’ll make those brackets and install them tomorrow. I would have done it today, but it got dark and I got lazy.

LOG ENTRY: SOL 209

Cold night last night. The solar cells were still detached from the farm, so I had to leave the Hab in low-power mode. I did turn the heat back on (I’m not insane), but I set the internal temperature to 1°C to conserve power. Waking up to frigid weather felt surprisingly nostalgic. I grew up in Chicago, after all.

But nostalgia only lasts so long. I vowed to complete the brackets today, so I can return the panels to the farm. Then I can turn the damn heat back on.