need help with RGB strips

thecrazylightlady

Yes I admit it.....I have the C.L.A.P
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Aug 26, 2011
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I want to use 5050 RGB strips this year to highlight my planter boxes and was wondering if someone can tell me how many can i join together and what size transformer or power supply i should use. The strips are 5 m long and have 30 leds per meter
 

AAH

I love blinky lights :)
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David_AVD has a calculator on his da_share site that lets you work out the current for pixels and strips etc. http://www.da-share.com/calculators/led-strip-string-current/
The number of strips that you can hang off a given output is dependent on the controller that you are using. It varies from 1A per channel to 5A per channel. As an example 5m of 12V 30led/metre strip works out to 3A over the 3 channels. This is 1A per colour so just about any controller will handle 5m of that strip. Joining a 2nd strip will double the current which isn't a huge issue for the strip itself but may cause voltage drop issues at the far end with possible pinkness at the far end when the whole thing is turned on to 100% white.

That 1 5m strip will use 3A @ 12V so that's 36W. In theory you could just about get 10 36W strips running off a 350W power supply but I wouldn't recommend going over 8.

Hope that helps.
 

thecrazylightlady

Yes I admit it.....I have the C.L.A.P
Joined
Aug 26, 2011
Messages
165
Location
Adelaide, South Australia
thanks Alan,
yes this is very helpful. i didnt plan on running these on a controller, they come with a remote so you can change the colours, just wasnt sure if i could connect at least 4 together and figured i would need a power supply as we connected a heap together and blew the transformer
 

mborg10

Michael Borg
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claremont meadows
thecrazylightlady said:
thanks Alan,
yes this is very helpful. i didnt plan on running these on a controller, they come with a remote so you can change the colours, just wasnt sure if i could connect at least 4 together and figured i would need a power supply as we connected a heap together and blew the transformer
Some of the cheap transformers that come with the strip are just that cheap. If they have supplied a transformer with the strip and controller chances are it is only sized to power that one strip. They are not in he business of wasting money and supplying bigger transformers than required. So using the calculator you may need a bigger transformer and more than likely power injection between strips as well.
 
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