Amp clarification 1602W

[jmraider]

Can someone clarify the AMP capicity. I have read that each channel is 8 amp and the entire unit is 30 amp. With 16 channels and if you do math 16 channels times 8 amp that equals for than 30 amp total for the controller.

When looking at one side of a 16 channel controller (8 channels), each channel has a maximum of 8 amps, however you have to figure if you use up 8 amps on one channel then you only have 7 amps on the remaining 7 channels on one side or 1 amp per channel. On the other side of the controller (8 channels) you still have up to 15 amps total. Therefore the total unit has 30 amps....15 amps per 8 channels on each side.

Is the above correct? If not can you expalin to me what is correct.

thank you

[Don]

You've got it correct.

In theory one could load a controller up with 64 amps worth of lights. So long as they do not exceed the 15amp per side/30amp overall limit, you wouldn't have an issue. Granted, this isn't something I would advise doing, just noting its possible.

One other thing to consider is the 80% rule of electricity. I'll let those more qualified than I discuss exactly when it applies. The short version of the 80% rule is you limit your load to 80% of capacity. So, 12a side/24a total. (I'm not implying you must follow the 80% rule or else you will have problems. I'm simply giving you more information to consider.)

[Surfing4Dough]

Max capacity of lights turned on at once:

8A per channel

15A per bank (Ch1-8, 9-16)

30A total for the controller.

So technically, you could have 8A on all channels 1-8, but you would only be able to turn on one at a time since as soon as you turned on 2 you would exceed the 15A per bank. Remember that just because you have the lights plugged into the controller, they are only using power if they are sequenced to be on.

Some recent discussions on this topic:

Edited October 19, 2012 by Surfing4Dough