Strip Installation on roof eaves

Hey Guys,

Very new to this, though am wanting to install an addressable led strip (15m) on my roof eaves (accessible via balcony), though it seems most of these installs are being done by hobbyists themselves?

Does anyone specialise in complete installs? Or would it just be a local sparky? I’m based in Sydney.

As I’m not very handy, was hoping just to outsource this whole component and that way could ensure the best products were used.

You would be very lucky to find a sparky that is into this, that isn't already time poor working on his own jungle of pixels in time for Halloween / Christmas.

There are quite a few products available for permanent installation.

Personally I am still trying to get hold of some ready made 1 inch spaced aluminium track, I will have an answer on this soon and can share. It's about 45mm wide by 22mm deep to suit 12mm pixels, Bullet or square.

Just double checking no installers for this?

It is increasingly common to see "permanent rgb lighting" companies in the US. I'm sure there are similar companies or installers in Sydney. Google "christmas light installers sydney" or "permanent rgb lighting sydney" and call a few places to see what they offer.

I bet one of the Australian lighting suppliers would be happy to put together a package for you that you could self install. Expect a bit of a markup for them to do the front end work. You could always call a sparky to do the actual install as well.

I’ve tried that though unfortunately keep coming up short, initially I think I was too optimistic on how easy it would be to find someone, haha.

Bigred11 said:

I’ve tried that though unfortunately keep coming up short, initially I think I was too optimistic on how easy it would be to find someone, haha.

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If you only have a smallish area to cover and minimal DIY ability/desire you could look at a pre-packaged solution from Amazon or the like. Lighting seems to be more a DIY hobby than a money making business in Australia (for the moment) but may be more of the installers in future..


search youtube for Govee vs Eufy rgb and there should be loads of videos..

RolyT said:

If you only have a smallish area to cover and minimal DIY ability/desire you could look at a pre-packaged solution from Amazon or the like. Lighting seems to be more a DIY hobby than a money making business in Australia (for the moment) but may be more of the installers in future..

Permanent Holiday LED Installation – The Hook Up

www.thesmarthomehookup.com

search youtube for Govee vs Eufy rgb and there should be loads of videos..

Click to expand...

Appreciate the alternative solution mate, I have seen the Govee Pros, which were tempting as have heard good reports, however prefer the effects the strips give. Looks like I’ll have to play the long game and hopefully find something,

This seems like a job you could knock off in a weekend with limited skill, some trunking, lights, power supply and a controller.

I installed on my eves with 16x10 Trunking from Bunnings, drilled holes in the side and pushed the leds through this, run my power injection wire through there also and clipped it all back together to provide a nice and neat finished product. I then glued some strong magnets inside to allow it to attach with magnets and was made to be easy to put up and take down but i ended up just leaving them up all year round.

EddieV said:

I installed on my eves with 16x10

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Did you use 12mm bullets? If so, how did they fit in 16mm wide trunking?

Yep, just standard 5v WS2811 Pixels, I made a jig and drilled the side of the trunking and also had space to run a power injection wire through there also.

With the silly season well and truly over, figured I’d take another stab at potentially finding a company who would be able to set this up, any recommendations?

Hi @Bigred11

I suppose it all depends on what your use-case is? Generally speaking friends don't let friends use strip light, and as such the recommendations you've seen thus far has been what we mostly use in the hobby - 12mm Pixels.

Based on your pictures you've posted and on some of the recommendations already in this thread, you will have a couple of options open to you to achieve what you are after. Bear in mind, this is my opinion, and opinions vary, and all of these will require a little bit of DIY.

BASICS:

You will require 3 Key items: (and a bonus 4th one)

1. A LED controller.
2. A power source
3. LEDs / Pixels.
4. Potentially conduit or aluminium to mount the Strip / Pixel.

1. LED Controller

If you use-case is simply to have permanent / semi-permanent Strip Installation on roof eaves I would recommend you look at a WLED compatible controller. WLED is open-source software, and you can control your Strip / Pixels from your smartphone or a computer using your WIFI connection.
There are plenty of WLED controllers available, but I recently came across this one. The build quality is solid, the lever connectors make it a breeze to work with, and it can control 5V to 24V LED's.

2. Power Source

Your power source will be dependant on which type of Stip / Pixel you choose.
For strip light you have multiple options in the 5V, 12V and 24V variants.
Pixels generally are either 5V or 12V.

There are many differences between the Voltage options, but in my opinion the biggest one is the amount of LED's / Pixels you can drive in one run without the need to Power Inject.
5V strip / pixels you will start seeing a colour change if you run more than 100 in 1 run.
12V strip / pixels you will start seeing a colour change if you run more than 150 in 1 run.
(Playing around with reduced power input to your LED's will allow you to run longer lengths. For example if you only power your LED's with 30% power, instead of 100% for each LED, you will be able to drive in excess of 250 LED's in 1 run. I have multiple runs of 250 + pixels without any real colour changes noticeable)

A 12V 5A Power Supply should be enough to get you started. Something like this.

3. LED - Strip

As I've mentioned before friends don't let friends use Strip, but if you want to go down that rabbit hole, I would suggest you source a Strip where you can control each LED individually and something with an IP rating of 65. Something like this may work well for you.
Mounting the Strip is pretty straight forward, as it comes with double sided sticky tape already applied, so all you have to do is stick it on your roof eves. I will say that I doubt you will get more than 1 season out of the Strip doing it this way as the Australian Sun will do it's business on both the Strip and the sticky tape. A good investment will be some Aluminium Channel. I recently bought these and found them to be pretty good.

3. Pixels

I would recommend you use 12V Pixels and mount them in either as suggested by EddieV or you look at something like this.

Finally, it may be a good idea to attend this year's Mini in Sydney.

I hope this helps, and good luck.

Domestos said:

Hi @Bigred11

I suppose it all depends on what your use-case is? Generally speaking friends don't let friends use strip light, and as such the recommendations you've seen thus far has been what we mostly use in the hobby - 12mm Pixels.

Based on your pictures you've posted and on some of the recommendations already in this thread, you will have a couple of options open to you to achieve what you are after. Bear in mind, this is my opinion, and opinions vary, and all of these will require a little bit of DIY.

BASICS:

You will require 3 Key items: (and a bonus 4th one)

1. A LED controller.
2. A power source
3. LEDs / Pixels.
4. Potentially conduit or aluminium to mount the Strip / Pixel.

1. LED Controller

If you use-case is simply to have permanent / semi-permanent Strip Installation on roof eaves I would recommend you look at a WLED compatible controller. WLED is open-source software, and you can control your Strip / Pixels from your smartphone or a computer using your WIFI connection.
There are plenty of WLED controllers available, but I recently came across this one. The build quality is solid, the lever connectors make it a breeze to work with, and it can control 5V to 24V LED's.

2. Power Source

Your power source will be dependant on which type of Stip / Pixel you choose.
For strip light you have multiple options in the 5V, 12V and 24V variants.
Pixels generally are either 5V or 12V.

There are many differences between the Voltage options, but in my opinion the biggest one is the amount of LED's / Pixels you can drive in one run without the need to Power Inject.
5V strip / pixels you will start seeing a colour change if you run more than 100 in 1 run.
12V strip / pixels you will start seeing a colour change if you run more than 150 in 1 run.
(Playing around with reduced power input to your LED's will allow you to run longer lengths. For example if you only power your LED's with 30% power, instead of 100% for each LED, you will be able to drive in excess of 250 LED's in 1 run. I have multiple runs of 250 + pixels without any real colour changes noticeable)

A 12V 5A Power Supply should be enough to get you started. Something like this.

3. LED - Strip

As I've mentioned before friends don't let friends use Strip, but if you want to go down that rabbit hole, I would suggest you source a Strip where you can control each LED individually and something with an IP rating of 65. Something like this may work well for you.
Mounting the Strip is pretty straight forward, as it comes with double sided sticky tape already applied, so all you have to do is stick it on your roof eves. I will say that I doubt you will get more than 1 season out of the Strip doing it this way as the Australian Sun will do it's business on both the Strip and the sticky tape. A good investment will be some Aluminium Channel. I recently bought these and found them to be pretty good.

3. Pixels

I would recommend you use 12V Pixels and mount them in either as suggested by EddieV or you look at something like this.

Finally, it may be a good idea to attend this year's Mini in Sydney.

I hope this helps, and good luck.

Click to expand...

Appreciate the time and detail you’ve put into your reply mate!

User case is a little for ambient lighting when I’m on the balcony at night, the alternate is the cool effects I can do for Christmas or just sh/ts and giggles.

I was more sold on strip lighting purely on the basis of some of the effects I’ve seen they can do. Out of interest, why don’t friends let friends use strip lighting?

There is the pixels idea, which I don’t might, though in my opinion the patterns don’t look as nice, else if I was to go down that similar route, there is also LIFX’s permanent solution. Which from a user point, they would tie in better with my ecosystem as all my other lights are LIFX, though again, think I may have over sold myself on a strip, haha.


Though again, whichever route I do go down, I’d much prefer to outsource. I’m typically not very handy and don’t enjoy doing it. It just still does seem more of an American thing and not much uptake over here.