Which power supply for injection with 2811 12v strips?

[marsh28]

I'm going to run six 12v 2811 strips around the window frames of my house next year with the ECG P2 controller. Port 1 will control 3 strips and Port 2 will control the other 3. the distance between stips will be small (less than 5 feet) and I plan on injecting power between each stip and at the end. What power supply do I need for the injections 150w, 350w? Thanks

 

[nato595]

I figure that you are totalling about 145W of draw, therefore a 150W would PROBABLY be okay, but I would still use a 350W power supply so you aren't maxing it out, it's always good to have that extra padding.

 

[marsh28]

Thats what I was thinking. Thanks for the help.

 

[fasteddy]

Depending on the power supply you use would determine how much load you can put onto this.

If you used a Ray Wu power supply then i wouldnt load it up more than 85% tops and better to be under 80%, so a 150 watt Ray Wu power supply wouldnt be the best fit. You would be better using a 200 watt Ray Wu power supply in this case or larger.

If using a meanwell SP power supply then you could load that up pretty much to full load

 

[remoteutah]

You can recycle a used PC power supply. It is easy to adapt to handle the lighting. And they are fan cooled! Let me know if you need any help with that. I have a bunch of old 300-450 watt pc power supplies, so I have a few spares . I plan on getting some male molex plugs to allow me to plug directly into my light wiring... that way if a supply fails, it is easily changed out in minutes. I like them because I can drive both 5v strips and 12v modules with one supply!

 

[richardd]

Good Idea, I bet there are heaps of power supplies at the Tip now If I can just grab a few...

 

[marsh28]

Okay, so now I've got another question about power injection. As already noted, I plan on using the 12 v 2811 strips. To make it as easy as possible, I'm simply going to inject power before each pixel string with a 350 watt power supply. Ray Wu is soldering 3 core plugs to the end of each of the 2811 strips I'm using. So...how do I then connect the power supply to the strip? I've looked at the diagram on page 14 of the ECG Controller pdf and it appears I need to splice the ground cable running between the pixels to the power supply and then separately connect V+ (red wire) from the power supply to the strip. What's the easiest way to do this given I've already got the 3 core plugs soldered to the strips?

 

[fasteddy]

Okay, so now I've got another question about power injection. As already noted, I plan on using the 12 v 2811 strips. To make it as easy as possible, I'm simply going to inject power before each pixel string with a 350 watt power supply. Ray Wu is soldering 3 core plugs to the end of each of the 2811 strips I'm using. So...how do I then connect the power supply to the strip? I've looked at the diagram on page 14 of the ECG Controller pdf and it appears I need to splice the ground cable running between the pixels to the power supply and then separately connect V+ (red wire) from the power supply to the strip. What's the easiest way to do this given I've already got the 3 core plugs soldered to the strips?

You appear to understand the requirement from the diagram. The way I do it is I add a 2 core cable to the beginning of the strip where you are injecting power and cut the +V from the 3 core plug if using different power supplies between strip/strings.

Now you mention you will be using a 350 watt power supply per strip which seems a slight over kill as you could run upto 8 12vdc 30 LED/M strips from a 350 watt power supply, so if keeping power supplies seperate then you can save some coin by using 50 watt power supplies per strip instead unless you already have the 350 watt power supplies in which case you have plenty of capacity to grow without having to buy more power supplies in the future

 

[marsh28]

Okay, so now I've got another question about power injection. As already noted, I plan on using the 12 v 2811 strips. To make it as easy as possible, I'm simply going to inject power before each pixel string with a 350 watt power supply. Ray Wu is soldering 3 core plugs to the end of each of the 2811 strips I'm using. So...how do I then connect the power supply to the strip? I've looked at the diagram on page 14 of the ECG Controller pdf and it appears I need to splice the ground cable running between the pixels to the power supply and then separately connect V+ (red wire) from the power supply to the strip. What's the easiest way to do this given I've already got the 3 core plugs soldered to the strips?

You appear to understand the requirement from the diagram. The way I do it is I add a 2 core cable to the beginning of the strip where you are injecting power and cut the +V from the 3 core plug if using different power supplies between strip/strings.

Now you mention you will be using a 350 watt power supply per strip which seems a slight over kill as you could run upto 8 12vdc 30 LED/M strips from a 350 watt power supply, so if keeping power supplies seperate then you can save some coin by using 50 watt power supplies per strip instead unless you already have the 350 watt power supplies in which case you have plenty of capacity to grow without having to buy more power supplies in the future

Thanks for the response. The support on this board is awesome, btw.

 

[robt]

On the subject of using a computer power supply, how is that done? I've read several pages, one mentions you have to jumper out a switch, otherwise it will wait for the motherboard to power it up (which i knew, but i don't know how to bypass it), another page mentioned some other details, but pieces off several pages. I haven't managed to make it work yet, but i have several 250-350 watt atx power supplies..

One page mentioned i need to jumped the black and i believe green wires on the p1 (the one with 20 wires). But there are several black wires, 5 or 6 if i remember, are these all ground?

 

[rvenegas]

Just connect the Green wire with one of the black wire (all of them are gnd). Now when you connect your power supply it will start immediately and the only way to turn it off is unplug it from electricity. So i suggest to buy a cheap switch, and connect it to Green and black wire, so everytime you need to turn on and off your Power supply you just need to use the switch you just installed.

 

[robt]

All blacks are ground, thanks for that, the rest is easy..

 

[rvenegas]

Now that you have decided to use PC power supply for power inject (i Will do the same), i would suggest to buy a multimeter/tester and always test outputs.