Hi, Just introducing myself and a bit of a plug for a product I made.

shirec

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Jul 27, 2017
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Gday everyone, I'm from Engadine Sydney and have built small 10w RGB DMX flood/spot lights. I think they have come up really well so I placed 4 on eBay to see if they would sell. They might be too expensive to sell but I thought I would give it a crack as there's always a business idea to be tried.

Please lend me your advice or views on the matter.

http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/272779073987?ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1558.l2649

Also, hears my FB business page were ill probably post projects and other various electrical related stuff. If you can throw a like my way it would be appreciated.
https://www.facebook.com/xCenturyElectrical/
 

Roosta

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Hi,

Welcome aboard..

My only feedback is that they should have dmx pass through, ie, in and out, and they should be field address adjustable..
Otherwise neat product mate.. If they were WS281* rather than DMX512, I may be tempted..

Cheers...
 

Bryan H

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welcome.. Like you idea, but agree with Roosta. would be nice to have a pass through to chain a few together...
 

Richie4540

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From what I have seen from a few dmx items I have opened up the in and out are just a y junction on the pcb board so this could be done in wires outside of the fitting, others smarter than me can comment on if this would work over a long rang but should work in the average size garden.

Richie
 

David_AVD

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Joining a DMX device into a chain outside of the unit is not a problem as long as the "stub" (the tail on the fitting) length is not overly long. Less than 500mm is generally considered safe.
 

kane

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Funnily enough, a year or two back, I contacted Ray to get some DMX spotlights of this size built. But the ones he supplied could not colour mix (and from memory there was another issue with them, but can't remember what.. ended up giving them away to someone on here).. I already have the bulkier 10w spots for my chrissy display, but wanted some compact ones for the garden to replace some spotlights already in place (which are coloured and controllable by IR remote, but only individually)

So I could be interested (obviously as long as they colour mix). With the amount of free time I have these days something that is plug and play is what I'd want.. I'd be looking at a chain of 20-25 of them, obviously set to sequential starting DMX channels.

Regarding the DMX in/out - I seem to recall that although they are usually connected at the PCB - this doesn't mean you can simply put a junction anywhere you want - for some reason I think it needs to be done very close to the controller.. But I could be wrong!

Another issue for a big run of them would be voltage drop. So some pre-wired connectors to allow voltage injection would also be useful (along with calculations of how many you can do in one run)
 

David_AVD

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Even some professional DMX lights have the DMX in and out XLR connectors on a small PCB with just one cable running to the main board. This is a short stub (usually < 200mm) and works perfectly well.

In reality DMX will tolerate much longer stubs (up to a few metres), but I prefer to keep them under 500mm if at all possible.
 

Roosta

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From what I have seen from a few dmx items I have opened up the in and out are just a y junction on the pcb board so this could be done in wires outside of the fitting, others smarter than me can comment on if this would work over a long rang but should work in the average size garden.

Richie


I agree however doing this outside of the fitting in an outdoor environment is much more difficult and costly than i imagine 1x additional 4pin plug and gland would be inside your fitting..

And are they field addressable at all? Or if later someone has a shuffle of dmx devices, do they need to send to you for re-addressing?
 

shirec

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Yea, I like making them so the work is not so bad. If need be I could come up with a pretty fast assembly line and solder station...

For people talking about cascading DMX. I did have that idea but the PCB does not support in and out DMX, only parallel. Which is why they are addressed with the device that device that's $20. There's also another issue with in and out cascading DMX and that is the voltage drop. Routing a large enough power cable and data cable as plug and play is not conceivable with 12v. Paralleling and addressing is much more simple and easier to wire.

I run a 14 gauge speaker cable as a back bone and split of this with 4 wire security cable. I feel I have made it to much of a permanent installation which is what I am using it for as garden lighting and most would need it to be more plug and play.

Another issue is finding the right PCB. Literally, the only one I have now also from Ray WU only supports an in channel for DMX (no out). There is no other PCB that will support an exact 10w LED. This is due to the 3 channels on the LED using varying voltages. This can be fixed with a constant current instead of a constant voltage decoder. Luckily Ray Wu has exactly this. Before this, I was using a constant voltage decoder attached to another PCB from RobG that was a constant current PWM controller linked below. This fitted in the larger 10w square flood lights. Didn't look as nice as the new ones. But worked all the same.

I think someone asked about full colour mixing. They are standard 10w RGB leds with each channel supporting the 256 levels of dimming (if there is a different definition of colour mixing please let me know). I will link a video to the lights with a demo rainbow effect. Currently, my garden lights run through sequences on the free program called QLC+ or Qlight.

I haven't had to much interest in them yet so I probably won't go out of my way to attempt cascading DMX at the moment. I was thinking about creating a standard kit that comes with say 5 to 10 lights and completely plug and play. Works directly with a controller with no programming required. This would be slightly costly to create even as a demonstration so I just thought I would try these lights first.

For the person that linked that dm-100AC probably missed the AC part which I also missed first. Luckily I only bought one as a demo. As most people don't use AC for lighting as far as I am aware this PCB will not work. Also, AC transformers seem to be more costly. It took a lot of research because it doesn't come up with a lot of searches on google or Aliexpress but this is the PCB I use. Only Ray Wu sells this one. There is another vendor but its a slightly larger PCB.

The only thing I can really offer is ease of use so someone else doesn't have to order every part and haggle to get better prices. Glue the LEDs with heat paste. solder all the components and the plugs etc. Test the fitting. To someone doorstep in 5 days over 30 days etc.

In the end, I just think it's too complicated for most people. I need to come up with a way to make it less complicated or scrap the idea and try come up with some new business idea. Lighting for weddings anyone??? Appreciate everyones feed back and time, it's been fun either way.

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/DM-...32636590851.html?spm=a2g0s.9042311.0.0.1cbx3n

https://www.tindie.com/products/RobG/10w-rgb-flood-light-kit-dumb-rgb/

 

djgra79

My name is Graham & I love flashing lights!
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Hi Shirec. Appreciate your efforts to finding a solution for the wider community. As mentioned above, dmx in & out is most preferred for the Christmas lighting community as we like to have full control of all lights via the pre-programmed sequences we create. I think your solution may be better suited to a permanent installation, which some members may want, but I think you'll find the bulk of us require flexibility to use these elements during Christmas or other events like Halloween etc. that can be incorporated with the rest of our displays rather than stand alone.
 

David_AVD

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What most people here are calling "DMX in and DMX out" is really "DMX in and DMX thru" with a simple Y junction at the light. No need for the DMX LED board to regenerate the signal.
 

diyer

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What most people here are calling "DMX in and DMX out" is really "DMX in and DMX thru" with a simple Y junction at the light. No need for the DMX LED board to regenerate the signal.

This is true, but IMHO the usefulness of the lights would be increased if they were addressable.
 
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