My new Miditree idea

lithgowlights

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May 6, 2010
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1,023
After the close and packup of the 2012 show I decided that I really needed to work on a better minitree design. My existing trees have 100 RGB LED's over a black mesh and do look quite good and neat for what they are, and considering they are 6 seasons old, they have done quite well over the years

While looking for snow machines on eBay, I found 8 120cm white Christmas Trees for $132, delivered, so a week later they arrived. 150 5V RGB LED's cable tied to the tree, with power injection each 50 LED's and we have the following comparison video....

http://youtu.be/maxYVPrOrzA
 

lithgowlights

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May 6, 2010
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1,023
Yes dumb. Power injection can be done on smart strings, or dumb ones like this. It's explained, with diagrams, in the 101 manual, but basically I have a 4 wire cable run to each end, and every join between 50 pixels. This cable comes back to the one point where the connection to the controller is located.
 

CDN_Diesel

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Joined
Nov 16, 2012
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12
Location
Chilliwack, BC
very cool. more lights on the original would look just like your new white trees. :) Love the light reflection of the white trees. Great job!
 

bovonic

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Joined
Dec 28, 2011
Messages
25
Location
Sydney
If you use 5A a tree, do you have to only run 2 at a time to stay below 10A on the circuit (assuming you're running power from a standard 10A power point which you're probably not! :D )
 

lithgowlights

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May 6, 2010
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What? That's 5A at 5 volts - 25 watts, not at 240V (Which would be 1200 watts!!!!!).

I don't do 240V lights at all now.
 

bovonic

New elf
Joined
Dec 28, 2011
Messages
25
Location
Sydney
Sorry! Really need to get my head around non 240V lighting - no idea how to calculate what load you can have on a house circuit when it's not 240V...
 

Chicken Little

New elf
Joined
Jan 24, 2013
Messages
5
You need to understand Ohms Law. It doesn't matter whether you convert AC to DC (Rectifier) or DC to AC (Inverter), power consumption is equal on both sides (ignoring losses - primarily heat).
Also voltage and current are inversely proportional to each other so if voltage increases, current decreases by the same proportion (& visa versa).
Therefore, 5 Amps at 5 Volts (DC) is 25 Watts = ?? Amps at 240V (AC) (also 25 Watts). Since 240V is 48 times greater than 5V we have to reduce (divide) 5A by 48 to find the current at 240V = 0.1 Amps (well within the 10A limit of a 240V AC circuit).

Chicken.
 
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