Strange Problem

[bdeditch]

I am not going to say it ruins the display, but just strange. I have my LED blue Icicle Lights, draw of .28 amps, and my gemmy icicle lights, draw of 1.50 amps, controled by 2 different controlers. Every so often I notice that both of these strings go out for about a second and then come back on. I have checked sequences and they have no "off" spaces in any of them. Anything elese I should be looking at?

[Max-Paul]

Let see if I understand the situation. Two strings of blue icicles. Both are made by different manufacturers, and both are on different controllers. Now both strings are blinking off, even though both are programmed to be on. Is that full 100% on or 10% on? I noticed that blue is one of those colors that need more wattage to be seen than say white. I have both white and blue LED icicles and the blue takes longer to show up when I am alternating the WW and Blue. Both have the same ramp time and the same min and max values.

[James Shelby]

Did you install your load resistors??????? That fixed all my LED problems.

[bdeditch]

James Shelby wrote:

Did you install your load resistors??????? That fixed all my LED problems.

How do you do that?

[bdeditch]

Max-Paul wrote:

Let see if I understand the situation. Two strings of blue icicles. Both are made by different manufacturers, and both are on different controllers. Now both strings are blinking off, even though both are programmed to be on. Is that full 100% on or 10% on? I noticed that blue is one of those colors that need more wattage to be seen than say white. I have both white and blue LED icicles and the blue takes longer to show up when I am alternating the WW and Blue. Both have the same ramp time and the same min and max values.

No Max its more than 2 strings, it would be about 15 strings of the Walmart Blue Icicle lights and about the same of the snowfall icicle lights. I would say that everything is set at 100%, should I set them lower, as in intensity?

I noticed tonight they went off and on and then when they did come back on the icicle lights were shimmering.

[James Shelby]

bdeditch wrote:

James Shelby wrote:

Did you install your load resistors??????? That fixed all my LED problems.

How do you do that?

In my display I have found wire lengths over 30 feet and more than 8 strands I need snubbers. I think you can find a link here or over at PC. I have extra if you send me a pm I'll mail you a handful.

[John]

Are you sure your icicle lights don't have the little controller box for special effects on the end of the string?

Is it these WalMart icicle lights?
http://www.walmart.com/ip/Holiday-Time-Twin-Cicle-Icicle-Light-Set-300-Count/13012412

They show this information at the WalMart web site - "Holiday Time blue and white twinkling icicle lights will create the illusion of melting icicles"

They say they are "twinkling". Are yours?

For reference the LED string terminator directions can be found on the "Crazy Light Lady" web site here: http://www.crazylightlady.us/TerminatorsHow-To.html

[bdeditch]

John wrote:

Are you sure your icicle lights don't have the little controller box for special effects on the end of the string?

Is it these WalMart icicle lights?
http://www.walmart.com/ip/Holiday-Time-Twin-Cicle-Icicle-Light-Set-300-Count/13012412

They show this information at the WalMart web site - "Holiday Time blue and white twinkling icicle lights will create the illusion of melting icicles"

They say they are "twinkling". Are yours?

For reference the LED string terminator directions can be found on the "Crazy Light Lady" web site here: http://www.crazylightlady.us/TerminatorsHow-To.html

No those are not the ones. Mine are the blue ones, no effects.

[zman]

This is the snubber thread over on Planet Christmas. A lot of us are using these to eliminate the capacitance build up. They should help with performance and longevity of the LEDs:

http://forums.planetchristmas.com/showthread.php/37562-Easiest-Terminators-Snubbers-to-make?highlight=snubbers

[jimswinder]

For a quick check to see if it is capacitance build up, just plug something into the end of the lights...another string (incandescents), air freshener, single light bulb...

anything with a load...

I had the same problem last year with my blue icicle lights...

Strange though...I forgot I had that problem and did not plug anything into them this year and they are working fine...though they are on 3 channels as opposed to 1 last year.

[bdeditch]

jimswinder wrote:

For a quick check to see if it is capacitance build up, just plug something into the end of the lights...another string (incandescents), air freshener, single light bulb...

anything with a load...

I had the same problem last year with my blue icicle lights...

Strange though...I forgot I had that problem and did not plug anything into them this year and they are working fine...though they are on 3 channels as opposed to 1 last year.

Thanks I will try that

[bdeditch]

zman wrote:

This is the snubber thread over on Planet Christmas. A lot of us are using these to eliminate the capacitance build up. They should help with performance and longevity of the LEDs:

http://forums.planetchristmas.com/showthread.php/37562-Easiest-Terminators-Snubbers-to-make?highlight=snubbers

Would these work? It seems that is all Radio shack has in my area that is 1 watt, but they have 1/2 watt ones.

http://www.radioshack.com/product/index.jsp?productId=2062296&filterName=Type&filterValue=1-watt+resistors

[bdeditch]

I went to Radio Shack and all they had was 47K 1/2 watt resistors. I made some snubbers up and hopefully that will take care of the problem.

[James Shelby]

http://www.mouser.com/Search/ProductDetail.aspx?qs=W4SVoLh3QChrWRjjAMNWeQ%3d%3d

Try this link first. I have placed an order one day and received the parts the next morning.

[bdeditch]

Well I tried the snubbers and that didn't help. I finally just put all of these lights on a power supply not used from LOR and haven't had any problems all night.

The weird part it was just the lights that were on steady. They would go off, come on a few seconds later, then go off again. Sometimes there was about a 10 to 15 second time frame they just stayed off. Sometimes the blue LED icicle lights would just shimmer for about 20 seconds before all of the strings would shut down.

[Fabian]

Any chance you have the same unit ID and channel combination configured somewhere else by accident?

[bdeditch]

No Fabian,

I used unit 4 plugs 1, 14, 15, 16. All on the same unit.





Fabian wrote:

Any chance you have the same unit ID and channel combination configured somewhere else by accident?

[Guest guest]

Have you tried putting a different string, maybe some incans, on those channels to see if it behaves the same way? Would definitely eliminate the controller being the issue.

My bet is it is the LED strings, but I have all of 750 LEDs in my display...

[bdeditch]

At first I had both strings plugged into only 2 plugs. Both of these strings are LEDS, the blue icicle lights are walmart, and the Snow icicle lights are made by gemmy. I then split the strings and plug them in the 4 circiuts with the same results. I am sure its the lights as well.



DonFL wrote:

Have you tried putting a different string, maybe some incans, on those channels to see if it behaves the same way? Would definitely eliminate the controller being the issue.

My bet is it is the LED strings, but I have all of 750 LEDs in my display...

[James Shelby]

Another thing to try. Do you still have two power cords connected to each controller? If your amp load is not that high pull one power cord off and jumper the two sides together. I run three phase power and I've seen a lot of strange problems, it took me until the third season to get all the bugs worked out and this year with 64 controllers no problems.