Planning Stages Already

[JBullard]

PaulTM wrote:

What am I missing here ??

QUALITY LED lights.

30 controllers 90% LED, with a few incadescents thrown in. Less then 30 amps total power draw and no expensive heavy duty extension cords, no need to pay for subpanels and electricians.

[kzaas]

JBullard wrote:

PaulTM wrote:

What am I missing here ??

QUALITY LED lights.

30 controllers 90% LED, with a few incadescents thrown in. Less then 30 amps total power draw and no expensive heavy duty extension cords, no need to pay for subpanels and electricians.

JBullard has a very valid point. Since you are just starting out, start building your stock with LED's and you won't need to worry about all that extra power. LED's are expensive but will cut your power bill 90% over incandesants plus yous can plug more strings together to make a long run when needed. On Incandesants the best you can do is eight strings together. Also LED's don't fade like the incandesants, a blue incandesant only lasts 2-3 years if your lucky then it becomes clear.

[PaulXmas]

I don't think anyone runs their controller under a full load.

I have 7 controllers and even though I do use 4 circuits I did test using just one 15 amp circuits!

Go LED and you shouldn't have to worry about it.

[PaulTM]

Great info here, thank you to everyone for your replies.

I hear you on the LED subject, I like how many can be strung together and the low power requirements, HOWEVER, unless they invent a CLEAR LED string that will actually show as BRIGHT CLEAR then my wife is NOT interested :P The current LEDs out there that we have tried are disappointing and she is not a fan of the colored bulbs.

She foresees the color palette for our display as red and white(clear) lights. I've actually seen some houses in our area with this and this looks VERY nice but they are ALL using the incandescents for their brightness.

One new question would be about the sales I've heard about here. Is notice posted before hand on the forum?? I'd like to get the software as soon as possible but don't want to miss any specials by buying the whole package too soon :)

[PaulXmas]

Sign up for the mailing list and an email will be sent out before the sale.

http://www.lightorama.com/JoinMailList.html

Just make sure the email does not go to your junk mail.

[Mike Cole]

I think I would look at some other issues of the display first. You really need to plan your layout and light count first. Then you will have a good idea how things will be in the yard and how many, and where ,the lights will be. This will determine controller location and how much power each controller will need. You will probably find that some controllers will only draw a small amount of power, based on what there operating, and could be on the same circuit as another. My leaping lights, two arches, draw 5 amps at all on. I have two. My candy canes draw about the same. So these 3 controllers all go to the same circuit. A good design plan should be first.
I have a 200 amp service at my house. I do have gas heat, and a gas water heater, but everything else is electric. I have 8 dedicated 20 amp circuits in the garage to run my show which powers 21 controllers. Heavy duty 12 gauge cords run from these out to the controllers. All 65,000 lights are incandescent, including about 500 c9s. I do have to be carefull when programing my seguences, that I dont turn on the red gutter lights when the green gutter lights are on, and so on. But careful planning will go a long way with power management.