Ask HN: Harvesting LEDs,Solar panels,400ma batts of $1 solar garden lights, for?

I purchased 200 $1 solar rechargable garden lights at the dollar store.

I placed many about – but have a lot left.

They come with an LED, a solar panel, and a 400ma battery (AA sized) (super weak battery) – but they are cool…

I have more than I can use, I took a few and opened them up and replaced the AA sized 400ma batt with some other 1200ma’s and they were super brighter…

However.

I would like to harvest the parts from these solar lights (specifically the solar charging capability and attach them to a battery array with the solar array to a USB charging port as a way to learn how to do this.

Clueless.. I am seeking a mentor on how to do such, and I will send you a number of these devices to unlock yourself, but teach me how to harvest these objects and put them in series? to power / charge other devices.

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I have a few solar powered battery blocks, but I love the idea of using these little 1.5×1.5 inch solar panels to trickle a battery — but more flexibly placed on something like a back pack or umbrella…

with the goal of teaching this to kids, but in this respect, I am a kid and would like to learn…

I don’t know about creating a new series of either batteries or series of solar panels.

(In a backpack, what I would like to do is get a few replacement iPad batteries and have them slotted into a backpack and have the cheapo solar cells charge the ipad batts in the backpack…)

I have around 100+ of these $1 garden lights… (I couldnt pass up buying a solar power, a nimh 400ma battery and LED with controller board for $1 each…)

But now I am looking to a solution for the problem of having all these devices I want to build something else from.

Anyone tinker like this?