cutting rope light

[uppitt]

Hi everyone,

I have a mix of some old incandescent 30m rope light (I think most are just 2 wire from memory, no controller), and a LED 30m rope light (3 wire with controller) Most of the incandescent rolls have a metre of lights out here and there, only 1-2 metres in each rope. The LED rope also has a dodgy connection somewhere towards the end, and I've lost approx 3-4 metres with that from memory. Sometimes those last few metres starts working if I bend the rope one way....

anyway, a question I wanted to ask, is all rope light able to be cut every so many metres ?

I have just bought another 30m LED rope off ebay recently that has marks on it where it can be cut every 2 metres, and wanted to know if this ability is available on any rope light? I would think it is, it's just a matter of knowing how many leds or incandescents per metre or 2.

I'm asking as I'm was wondering whether to look at cutting out all the dead sections ?

thoughts ?

 

[AAH]

The dead bits will give you a pretty exact indication of where the lights can be cut. they will typically go out in blocks of maybe 20 or 30 lights. If these are mains voltage rope lights be exceptionally careful with joining them back together as you will have broken the typical 3mm or so of insulation that they have. Heatshrink and silicon are an absolute must. I personally have retired mine as they develop faults as the time taken and the risks outweigh the replacement cost.

 

[uppitt]

yeah good point about the voltage. I suspect the incandescent ones without a controller will be 240V all the way through. I don't know if that's the case with the LED one that has an 8 mode controller on it,whether it drops the voltage down, as every metre or section is 36 LEDs. At least with that one the fault is at the end, so as long as I put on a new cap and seal it up where I shorten it , it should be fine. The very cheap incandescent ones are pretty cheaply made.