Using WS2811 Icicles to under soffit

G'day Everyone,
I have become very interested in lighting my house since last year stumbling across using a strip of WS2812B lights which I put on my fascia at Christmas and got excited.
I had all intentions of ramping it right up this year and starting early, but an out of town contract has meant I do not have a lot of time to get things going and I am only back in town for 3 weeks with a hold up on site and am trying to piece some things together.
Really hoping for some hope before I press the button on an order I am doing from Ray Wu's Store where I want to use the WS2811 icicles under the soffit at the front of the house, where I will require 5 sets joined together.
These are the ones:
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/ind...pm=a2g0s.13010208.99999999.268.30453c00gEr1Wz

Then Ray has recommended this power supply:
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/12V...pm=a2g0s.13010208.99999999.271.12973c00HvNOkQ

Also a pack of these for power injection (Not quite sure on how):
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/3-2...pm=a2g0s.13010208.99999999.265.12973c00HvNOkQ

Then I want to use a simple controller like the SP108E (I know, boring compared to what you guys are doing but baby steps)

My question (or questions) is: Am I on the right track with components for this? Is the power supply suitable? How many power injections?

If you guys could help that would be much appreciated. I have tried doing some homework on this and unfortunately electronics is something I don't know a lot about but I know I will as time goes on and I am going to persevere until I get a lighting show setup, hopefully with all the bells and whistles.

Thanks

Wheels

The power supply is 350w or 29a. the general rule of thumb for pixels is 60ma each at full white full brightness. Times that by 100 gives around 6amps, times 5 strings is 30amps. So if by chance you ran all leds at full white full brightness, you would overload the power supply.
In saying that, the amount of times this happens is rare, BUT, as you are not going to control your leds, but use a generic controller, there is the possibility that there is a white ramp built in. Also it is a good practice to only load a supply (these Chinese ones anyway) to 80% of rating.
So I would get 2 power supplies just to be sure.
The power injection basically connects the pixels together and has the "T" so you can hook up another "injection point" for connecting 12v to, as you go down the line, there is voltage loss, so you need to top that up so you don't have lights that stop working at the far end. I would just inject every 100 pixels.
One last thing, when ordering from Ray, put the bundle together in you cart, then send Ray a message and ask for a discount as he will normally do a better price on bulk shipping.
Also, in the past, I have found power supplies are more often than not cheaper to get off ebay here in Australia. and I mean quite a bit. So look on there.
What you are doing should work fairly well, just be sure you double check your wiring before powering everything up and if you are unsure, post a pic and get clarification.
Enjoy

Ok, Scamper this is good information.
I will have a look on eBay for a power supply as I had done a bit of a quick look around and thought the price was high compared to elsewhere, but being power I made an assumption that these must have been good quality therefore paying a premium.
Can you recommend the gauge of wire I should use for power injection and is that sourced from online as well?
I really appreciate the help with this.

Thanks

Wheels

Wheels said:

Ok, Scamper this is good information.
I will have a look on eBay for a power supply as I had done a bit of a quick look around and thought the price was high compared to elsewhere, but being power I made an assumption that these must have been good quality therefore paying a premium.
Can you recommend the gauge of wire I should use for power injection and is that sourced from online as well?
I really appreciate the help with this.

Thanks

Wheels

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Wire is a hard one as the price for delivery can be expensive. For power injection I tend to go for 2 core mains cable or heavy duty speaker cable or outdoor garden lighting cable, it just depends on what you can get your hands on at a decent price.
A while ago Masters closed down and I bought up big when they were in their last days, I got 2 core mains and garden lighting. Be careful with the garden lighting though as it is often not marked with a + or - as it is generally ac.
https://www.wiltronics.com.au/product/5815/2-core-fig8-7-5amp-mains-cable-white-100mtr-roll/
The above one is the type of cable, but I don't pay that much.
I also keep an eye out on gumtree and the like cause there are always electricians that flog it off cheap when they have excess from building sites etc.
https://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Univers...var=471408961480&_trksid=p2057872.m2749.l2649
I just bought a couple of these.
They may be a couple dollars more than rays, but free shipping.
When it is cheap power supplies, it is cheap power supplies. A lot of people go with meanwell supplies but they are so much more, I will take the chance with the cheap ones and replace them if they go. Touch wood so far I have not had a failure.

Thanks Scamper, I have a roll of the cable on order through an electrician mate, and I have some cheaper power supplies organised.
I will wait now and piece it all together when it arrives.

Ok fellas, thanks for your help to date. I have now received everything and have worked through 2 out of the 3 projects I had lined up without incident and have been very happy with the results.
I have now started on this project and I may have ran into a snag straight up.
This morning I laid out all of these icicles (5 sets) and didn't join them because luckily I thought if I stuff this up I will only damage one of them, well..... looks like I have fried one of them.
Now going off the the diagram that came with the "T" joiners I purchased (attached) I have read it as the blue wire is the data? So I have connected the blue wire into the controller as such and it did not work. So I went back to the previous project I did and used the same wiring setup (yellow/green) to data and it still didn't work, so fearing by then that I had damaged the light I plugged it in to a new set and it worked. So yes yellow/green data = correct.
Have I got that wrong for the "T" joiner? As in, is the blue the data? Actually when you look at it, I probably should of asked the question then because it doesn't look right.
Obviously powering the string up the way I did originally has killed it?
Now for the power injection, I have or did have 5 sets of these lights, can I inject power using 2 power sources, one at each end? How do I do that correctly? I have read somewhere that you can't have active from one source meeting up with active from another source?
I have added another picture showing components I am using.
Thanks for your help, sorry if these questions are convoluted but I am learning and I will get there.

You're using the same wire colours as I do (brown = pos, blue = neg/gnd, yellow = data)
HOWEVER - china don't have as strict rules around wire colours as we would be used to. So you should always check using a multimeter that the pins on the connectors match the wire colour whilst making cables. Then once you have that confirmed, I would create a reference guide for yourself to ensure every other connector and wire you use from now is the same. Colours of wires may change in the odd pigtail etc, but so long as the pins always line up, it should be fine.
Below is an example of what I have printed above my workbench for the past 2+ years and I still reference even today whilst making up new cables. I have similar hand-drawn reference for 2pin power injection leads also.
View media item 866

Thanks Graham this is certainly helpful to me and I take note for future.
I have learnt a costly lesson.
Are you able to help with the question I have on the power injection?

Thanks

Gauge of wire generally speaking bigger is better from the perspective of reducing the risk of voltage drop. 12v is less prone to voltage drop than 5v, but it can still happen over longer cable runs.
I use 4 core security cable in my display, and for my power injection leads I just twist 2 cores together for POS and 2 for NEG, and this has served me well. Others have not had as much success with security cable and may use a heavier gauge twin core wire. Individual results may vary based on cable type, length, prop location, brightness of display, location etc.
Not sure if you have considered fusing as yet but it certainly is highly recommended that you fuse as much as you can. There's some info and links for fusing options on this page and within the video which may assist: https://auschristmaslighting.com/me...-for-christmas-lights-2018-adelaide-mini.834/

Thanks Graham, I have a roll of the wire that Scamper suggested in a previous post, and I will get the fuses today as I hadn't considered this and it definitely makes sense.
I understand how to inject power if I was using the single power supply but I am still trying to nut out how I can use 2 power supplies on the same string. Because the string is 15 metres long it would make it easier and neater to inject the power at either end, but I am lead to believe that you can't have the the 2 positives meet? The strings I am using have a plug in waterproof connection and I have purchased "T" joiners for if I needed to inject power mid way. How do you connect these so the two positives don't meet?
Thanks for the link to the video, I have watched it and it was very helpful.
Hope I make myself clear with this question as I am still getting my head around this.

scamper said:

The power supply is 350w or 29a. the general rule of thumb for pixels is 60ma each at full white full brightness. Times that by 100 gives around 6amps, times 5 strings is 30amps. So if by chance you ran all leds at full white full brightness, you would overload the power supply.

Enjoy

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G'day Scamper, just looking at this again, I am proposing to use 5No. strings of these icicles with 60 nodes per string, your calculation shows x 100? Am I not getting this right?
Any advice on this would be great.

Thanks

Wheels said:

Thanks Graham, I have a roll of the wire that Scamper suggested in a previous post, and I will get the fuses today as I hadn't considered this and it definitely makes sense.
I understand how to inject power if I was using the single power supply but I am still trying to nut out how I can use 2 power supplies on the same string. Because the string is 15 metres long it would make it easier and neater to inject the power at either end, but I am lead to believe that you can't have the the 2 positives meet? The strings I am using have a plug in waterproof connection and I have purchased "T" joiners for if I needed to inject power mid way. How do you connect these so the two positives don't meet?
Thanks for the link to the video, I have watched it and it was very helpful.
Hope I make myself clear with this question as I am still getting my head around this.

Click to expand...

To use 2 power supplies on the same string then you have to cut the positive wire about half way along the string so only the negative and data wires are continuous.