Rabeiler Posted December 30, 2016 Share Posted December 30, 2016 I am starting to plan for next year. I have 12 windows and 1 door that I would like to encircle with RGB lights. Each string would just be one color, not individual control of each bulb (like CCBs). I would be using a couple of RGB controllers, probably a couple of the CMB-24D controllers. The issue is that several of the runs will probably be about 50 feet. What is recommended for the 4 conductor cable? Do I need a really beefy power supply at the controller to handle the extra cable length? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr. P Posted December 30, 2016 Share Posted December 30, 2016 I have some RGB runs that are 70+ feet and I use the 18 gauge RGB cable with a regular 350 watt power supply. If you use a 16 or 18 gauge wire you should be good. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
k6ccc Posted December 30, 2016 Share Posted December 30, 2016 Like Mr. P said, no problem with long cable runs with dumb RGB. I'm doing most of my dumb RGB with 16 AWG four conductor speaker cable that I get from Monoprice.com. My longest run is about 50 feet with six meters of dumb strip on the end.Sent from my Droid Turbo via Tapatalk, so blame any typos or spelling errors on Android Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rabeiler Posted December 30, 2016 Author Share Posted December 30, 2016 Thanks Jim and Mr. P Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gsmith37064 Posted December 30, 2016 Share Posted December 30, 2016 My dumb RGB mini trees are 100 ft from yard to garage and no issues. Bright as can be. I use 18awg wire that i get from Ebay and Holidaycoro. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lightingnewb Posted December 31, 2016 Share Posted December 31, 2016 So... here's a cool thing I found out from WowLights: They have dumb ribbon and the power cords... you either run one ribbon (16.5 ft) with ~100ft of extension with no problem or 33 ft of dumb ribbon (2 ribbons connected together) at their baseline extension... outside of that, injection may be needed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BECKfamilylights Posted December 31, 2016 Share Posted December 31, 2016 Great ? This answered a lot of questions I had going into next year. I'm going to be using dumb ribbon for my facia and roof line. I'm cutting the ribbon into 18" to 21" sections and and wiring them from channel 1-6 to give them more of a smart strip look.Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lightingnewb Posted January 6, 2017 Share Posted January 6, 2017 On 12/31/2016 at 7:49 AM, BECKfamilylights said: Great ? This answered a lot of questions I had going into next year. I'm going to be using dumb ribbon for my facia and roof line. I'm cutting the ribbon into 18" to 21" sections and and wiring them from channel 1-6 to give them more of a smart strip look. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Intriguing! How many controllers do you have? Remember, RGB controllers typically only have 8 slots, so beware of how many channels you're consuming. In the picture attached, the left column represents the physical outlet/plug, the right corresponds to the color and number scheme. 8 plugs, 24 channels. 3 channels per plug (Red/Green/Blue). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BECKfamilylights Posted January 6, 2017 Share Posted January 6, 2017 Intriguing! How many controllers do you have? Remember, RGB controllers typically only have 8 slots, so beware of how many channels you're consuming. In the picture attached, the left column represents the physical outlet/plug, the right corresponds to the color and number scheme. 8 plugs, 24 channels. 3 channels per plug (Red/Green/Blue).Planning on 2 cmb24d for the house. The roofline is 75' and facia is 90'. This project is going to be a lot of cutting and splicing of the waterproof strip lights. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Randy Martin Posted January 6, 2017 Share Posted January 6, 2017 I have used rgb dumb strips cut into 3ft. sections mounted onto pvc conduit under my eves to make it look like smart strips. I used the 27 channel dumb DMX controllers and wired it with thermostat wire. The effect looks good. My house has aluminum clad eves so bought the green clips made by Noma and modified them so I could zip tie two clips per section and just clip it to the soffit. This makes install quick and easy. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BECKfamilylights Posted January 6, 2017 Share Posted January 6, 2017 I have used rgb dumb strips cut into 3ft. sections mounted onto pvc conduit under my eves to make it look like smart strips. I used the 27 channel dumb DMX controllers and wired it with thermostat wire. The effect looks good. My house has aluminum clad eves so bought the green clips made by Noma and modified them so I could zip tie two clips per section and just clip it to the soffit. This makes install quick and easy. I'm looking to do something similar. I'm mounting the strips to a pvc pipe cut in half. Mounting the pipe on a 1x4x10' which that will hang on the facia boards with anchors put on roof. I plan on just making hangers on boards so it's quick and easy to install. Each board will have quick connects so I can plug them all in together. All together on facia boards I will have 9 channel 1's and so on. This will give me the option to make a chasing effect across the house. I was looking at 18/8 thermostat wire to go between the sections.Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ebrown1972 Posted January 6, 2017 Share Posted January 6, 2017 Will cat5 cable work with dumb RGB by twisting the pairs together? I have a lot of cat5 cable so I may give this a try for extensions for some of my dumb lights. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
k6ccc Posted January 6, 2017 Share Posted January 6, 2017 6 minutes ago, ebrown1972 said: Will cat5 cable work with dumb RGB by twisting the pairs together? I have a lot of cat5 cable so I may give this a try for extensions for some of my dumb lights. I generally don't recommend it unless it's powering a VERY small load. Cat-5 uses quite small wire. Even when using both wires of each pair for one conductor, it's only approximately equal to a single 21 AWG wire. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ebrown1972 Posted January 6, 2017 Share Posted January 6, 2017 3 minutes ago, k6ccc said: I generally don't recommend it unless it's powering a VERY small load. Cat-5 uses quite small wire. Even when using both wires of each pair for one conductor, it's only approximately equal to a single 21 AWG wire. All of my pixels are ran by cat5. I have runs of 50 feet with no issues. But with pixels I only use one wire for data, 3 wires for + and 4 wires for ground..With dumb RGB I could only use a pair for each wire. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
k6ccc Posted January 6, 2017 Share Posted January 6, 2017 4 minutes ago, ebrown1972 said: All of my pixels are ran by cat5. I have runs of 50 feet with no issues. But with pixels I only use one wire for data, 3 wires for + and 4 wires for ground..With dumb RGB I could only use a pair for each wire. Even with three and four wires for power and ground respectively, I'd be willing to bet that if you turned all pixels on to full white and measured the voltage drop, it would be pretty bad - unless it's a small number of pixels. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ebrown1972 Posted January 6, 2017 Share Posted January 6, 2017 6 minutes ago, k6ccc said: Even with three and four wires for power and ground respectively, I'd be willing to bet that if you turned all pixels on to full white and measured the voltage drop, it would be pretty bad - unless it's a small number of pixels. My longest runs using 100 pixels per run are about 35 feet. When on all white at 100 percent intensity I have no issues whatsoever. My other runs are 50 pixels at 50 foot. No issues there either. I use only 12 v pixels. Since I have the cat5 I will give it a test and see what happens. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ebrown1972 Posted January 6, 2017 Share Posted January 6, 2017 When I yes i only use all white at 100 percent. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ebrown1972 Posted January 6, 2017 Share Posted January 6, 2017 Just now, ebrown1972 said: When I yes i only use all white at 100 percent. Test Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BECKfamilylights Posted January 6, 2017 Share Posted January 6, 2017 I'll be waiting for results. Cat5 is less $Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ebrown1972 Posted January 7, 2017 Share Posted January 7, 2017 20 hours ago, BECKfamilylights said: I'll be waiting for results. Cat5 is less $ Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk As soon as my dumb rgb stuff comes in later this week I will get them tested and post the results here. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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