ColonelChristmas
New elf
So my goal for next year is to add RGB to my display. I really appreciate all the knowledge on this fourm so I am asking for some help. I have spent the last three evenings trying to cut and sodier your run of the mill 5 meter 5050 SMD waterproof strip lights. I have watched the videos in other threads here and I am not a novice with a sodiering iron and this is not easy. I first tried the snap-on 4 wire connectors and found the fail rate was not acceptable. I would no sooner get one connection working and then another would work itself loose. I am working on a 5 foot start. So then I went to sodiering wires to the copper pads. I found that thin copper could not hold up to the angle I was trying to turn from the stress from the wire. I would get a joint all sodiered and the copper pad would lift off of the light strip. I also found that when you strip off the water proofing the copper pads have a thin corrosion that must be scrapped off to get the sodier to stick. I have pretty much destroyed a full set of light experimenting. My solution is to actually use the 4 wire connectors and only partially slide tem on the pad and then sodiering the to the remaing pads. Haaving the extra plastic supporting the connection seems to be the trick. Has anyone done this and has it held up. We deal with winter winds in the 30-50 mph range and I need something that is going to hold up.