DMX COnstuction /Assembly / Testing

[Lincoln Lights]

I just got my shipment of DMX controllers (20), power supplies, cat 5 connectors, cat 5 splitters, etc from holiday coro. (Got the shipment in by the last minute before Dave went to china.) Also, I just got my replacement usb 485's from LOR, and they were the root of my initial DMX problems. New ones worked all day yesterday as I was at my desk plugging away. So, here is where I am at, and I would love to get some feed back.



1. I soldered the power output from the DC power supply to the cat 5 cable. I used solid brown, green, and orange for positive, and same color striped for neutral. Pin 4, Blue, is the positive dmx signal and 5 is the neutral / neg?. Thursday night, I completed the dc end of all 5 power supplies. Also, I soldered 6 dmx controllers to cat 5 cable. Went to bed thinking, I am going to get pretty good at soldering...

2. Friday, I received my new usb 485, configured and tested my network, and quickly began testing my previous work. This is where I ran into problems. First module worked perfectly, and I thought to my self, wow, this is pretty simple. Next controller worked, and than I tested the third controller. On the xlights tester, it worked as it should, but when I ran it on LOR, the red and green were backwards. And this initial problem snow balled into many more.

3. Checked the connections, good. Set it to a different channel, tested it on Xlights, worked again, and ran my lor sequence. Same problem. I thought I should daisy chan two of them and see what happens. Big problems. every time I hooked two modules together with a cat 5 splicer, the lights went haywire. Also, I noticed that the physical connection on the cat 5 splicers were stiff and continued to bend the pins inside the connection. As soon as I unhooked the second bad controller, the good one worked fine.

First question. How to Daisy chain properly so all controllers work properly instead of the situation I have where the colors (red and green) swap.

Second question. For the controller that works on xlights but not on LOR, any suggestions.

Third question, what is your experience with the quality of the 7 dollar controllers from holiday coro. Are they super sensitive and or good bad easily?

Forth question, Have you found the physical connections on the cat 5 connectors to be sensitive, and any tricks to ensure proper connections. I have a very nice cat5 combo tool from radio shack that crimps, cuts, and splices nicely. But I have thrown out about 5 or 6 cat 5 splicers, and a couple of couplers.

Fifth question: Instead of using splicers and couplers, has any one built or used a distribution panel ie a 66 punch down board or any similar products you can find at a big box store. If so, any recommendations.

I have bought and am going to assemble the guts of my display inside a 40 gallon heavy duty plastic container. It is going to be water proof, and it is going to have the cat5 dmx cable and a power cable come in on one end, and all of the cat 5 and electrical cords for the regular lor channels come out the other end. This is where I would place my distribution box for the dmx if this is a better idea than using couplers and splicers to Daisy chain.



Thanks.


Sean

[dave carlstedt]

without understanding your entire configuration, check one end of each conductor to the other end (after going thru couplings and connectors) that you didnt have a crossover somewhere in the run(s). You should have straight thru wiring. Most all of cat 5 is type "b", but if you included a type "a" somewhere, it may have caused a problem..

[CLD Kevin]

I think if you read Holiday Coro “Megaball” instructions, most of your questions will be answered. I used 27 of those little dmx controllers all daisy-chain together and had no issues. I injected power and the dmx signal using cat5 as you are doing. So most likely you have something connected wrong. It only takes one wrong connection to screw everything up.

I would verify as Dave stated. Are all you cat5 cables 568A or 568B? They all need to be one of the other...don’t mix them up.

Not to say how you are connecting it is wrong, but I used pins 1 & 2 (orn-orn/wht) for dmx signal. Dash wire for the DC Power and Solid wire for the ground. Also, remember that LOR USB485 uses pins 4 & 5 for the DMX signal. Most all other dongles/adapters use pins 1 & 2. I know when ran some test using xlight, it worked fine using both the Enntec and USB485 dongles.


Q1: Daisy-Chain is simple and straight forward. See page1 of the “Megaball” instructions. There is a picture of how to.


Q2: I’ve had problems using the USB485 too as a raw DMX dongle with LOR. I can tell you for sure...not only from other post, but my personal experience. If you use the 485 for your dmx dongle, it will be one channel off. So if your dmx controller is set to 1-3, you need to set the channel in the sequence to channels 2-4. This may be the cause of your colors being wrong.

Now if you use the Entec Open or Pro, then the channel on the controller and sequence match, but the Entec uses pins 1 & 2 (with XLR-RJ45 adapter)...which is what I prefer my dmx signal to be on.


Q3: I’ve had no issues with these controllers. I did not get mine from Holiday Coro, but I’m assuming they are the same.


Q4: You will find bad crimps and connectors from time to time, but generally they are good. I don’t make mine. Not that I cant as I have all the tools...it just easier to purchase them and for the cheap prices now of days...its worth it. And they test them too so chances are slim you get a bad one. Check out monoprice.com. They carry everything you need and just about every color and length. If you want to make your own, then I suggest you get a cat5 continuity test kit. Test every cable you make, then you know the cables are good.


Q5: No I haven’t used a 66-block...and I personally wouldnt.


Megaball instructions: http://www.holidaycoro.com/v/vspfiles/downloads/RGBMegaBallAssemblyInstructions.pdf


Kevin

[Lincoln Lights]

thanks for al of the input.... Status update,,,

I remember reading about the plus one channel config, but it completely slipped my mind. I actually logged into tell on myself about that... newbie mistake. I have officially tested two dmx channels on both lor and xlights, and I had initial success...Now if I couls speed up my asembly time, I might be able to sequence more than one song for st patty's day.

This is definately a learning experience, and I have two things going for me... First, even though I am like a bull in a china closet going at mach 5, I do learn best from doing and figuring it out... ie I like to pay my tuition to the school of hard knocks....
Second thing I have going for me is that I am more stubburn than a mule, so thats good too.

Thanks again,

[Lincoln Lights]

status update...

I have completed 6 dmx controllers, and I have them connected to my test lights. ( A 1x4 wood piece with 6 individual rgb led light modules connected.)

When I use xlights, I test each individual module, one channel at a time. Success. However, when I run a sequence in LOR, I do not acheive the same success. I have the channel configuration at +1. I have made all of my cat 5 lines, and I have tested them.

I am at a loss here.

[Lincoln Lights]

Update...



I have reprogrammed all controllers so that each controller number is 10x the origninal address. ie 7 beacme 70, 13 beacme 130, etc. I retested on xlights and each channel works. Tes of LOR and I am getting the right colors now, with out the plus one addressing, but I am getting serious flicker in the lights. Does not happen when I test with xlights.



Should I just go and get an entec?



Sean

[crackchecker]

Sean,

That's what I have been getting with the LOR usb dongle too. I think (we'll) loose the flicker and (in my case) the lag too by going with the EntecPro.

[Lincoln Lights]

Entec pro will be here tonight. Just got in my rainbow spots and floods. Attached the power to the spots last night. Easier than I thought it would be.

[Lincoln Lights]

STATUS UP DATE.... I received my entec pro this week, and after many hours of fabrication, I now have 5 working spots, and 5 working floods. 9 small shamrocks, 5 large shamrocks, and it is time to get a coule of songs sequenced for st pattys day. all lights are installed except for the rgb strips i have on order... if they come in time for st pattys, great, if not, they will be good to have. I will post the show when it is ready.... thnaks for the help....