Jeep parade

[BillyBayou]

I've been trying to figure this out on my own but kinda stumped on what kind of lights and controllers.  So I will just give my set up and wants. 

I plan to decorate my Jeep Wrangler for a Christmas parade of lights.  I want an off the charts light show. 

I have a 1500w inverter to plug into.  Music played through my stereo on the jeep or?

budget @ $1000 

Rather not run through my computer (Mac)

what do yall recommend?

 

thanks in advance

Bill

Edited September 27, 2017 by BillyBayou
Added info

[OzAz]

Lights - low wattage LEDs 

Controller - one of the many pixel controllers on the market. Depending on number of lights you want you might be able to run them all off a few Pis 

Computer - consider a Rasberry Pi

[BillyBayou]

9 hours ago, OzAz said:

Lights - low wattage LEDs 

Controller - one of the many pixel controllers on the market. Depending on number of lights you want you might be able to run them all off a few Pis 

Computer - consider a Rasberry Pi

Low watt LED's like as a string or tape? 

Id rather have a plug and play. I'm not sure about raspberry pi.  How would that compare to Showtime Central with the MSR program?

i appreciate your response 

[Speedster]

4 hours ago, BillyBayou said:

Low watt LED's like as a string or tape? 

Id rather have a plug and play. I'm not sure about raspberry pi.  How would that compare to Showtime Central with the MSR program?

i appreciate your response 

LED rope lights or strings of LED lights would work. 

I'm new to LOR this year and like you I wanted something that was Plug and Play.  I chose the ShowTime Central TSO Edition (which comes with miniDirector, an FM transmitter, an SD card with 12 TSO songs, and a ready-to-go 16-channel light controller) and bought a 2nd 16-channel light controller.  16 channels might be enough for you to deck out your Jeep, so maybe just go with the TSO ShowTime Central Starter Package:

http://store.lightorama.com/tsoshcestpa.html

http://www1.lightorama.com/showtime-central-tso/

If you like the "chasing" effect that is commonly used on leaping arches and mega trees, you might want to buy a 2nd light controller and set it to Controller Id #3 or #4, which are commonly used for leaping arches & mega trees.

One thing to note is that the TSO SD card has 60 seconds of silence between each song where the lights slowly fade in and out.  Even though the lights are doing something, I find the 60 seconds of silence rather annoying/boring.  For a parade, I would think that you would just want the songs to play one after another without that long gap of silence.  So I would suggest installing the software on a computer (by running the .exe file on the TSO card) and after registering the software, use the software to create a new SD card that has the TSO songs WITHOUT the 60-sec silent gaps between songs.  You can even re-order the songs to your liking, and exclude songs that you don't want to play.  You can also set it so that the songs loop continuously.  Even though I'm a newbie, I was able to create a new SD card with the 12 TSO songs and eliminate the gaps of silence between each song (SOOOO much better!!!).  If you decide to do this, make sure you use an SD card from Kingston Technology (4 - 32 GB, SDHC Class 4 or higher) because their cards are rated to work at -20 degrees (although you probably don't have to worry about it getting that cold in TX!).   LOR Help Desk does not recommend SanDisk cards due to problems that LOR users reported with them.

Since the ShowTime Central box has an FM transmitter, you can easily play the TSO songs through your Jeep's stereo system by setting the radio station to the same FM frequency that your FM transmitter is set to.

So for a simple plug and play setup that doesn't require a computer, I definitely recommend the TSO ShowTime Central Starter Package.

Edited September 28, 2017 by Speedster
Grammar correction

[BillyBayou]

That's great information! Thank you! This is likely the route I'll take. Now to figure what type of lights.  I saw ribbons that look like they would be easy to put onto a Jeep.  If not that, I may go with ropes.  Does the Showtime central allow you to use color changing LED's 

 

appreciate the information 

 

Also, I'm up in Richmond VA for work and that's where the parade is.  So it could be chilly

[Speedster]

I'm not sure if ShowTime Central works with ribbons or pixels, since I'm just starting out with regular LEDs that are one color.  But based on the extra hardware and the need for a computer that I see in this Pixel starter package and in this RGB starter package, I'm thinking that ShowTime Central by itself won't work with ribbons or pixels.  Hopefully some of the more-experienced LOR users can answer that question.  You can also submit a Help Desk ticket to address your questions/concerns too. 

Edited September 28, 2017 by Speedster

[BillyBayou]

2 hours ago, Speedster said:

I'm not sure if ShowTime Central works with ribbons or pixels, since I'm just starting out with regular LEDs that are one color.  But based on the extra hardware and the need for a computer that I see in this Pixel starter package and in this RGB starter package, I'm thinking that ShowTime Central by itself won't work with ribbons or pixels.  Hopefully some of the more-experienced LOR users can answer that question.  You can also submit a Help Desk ticket to address your questions/concerns too. 

Thank you!