Light Strips and PEX tubing

[scottam67]

Thanks for all the replies. Bumping the thread, I have to ask what may be an obvious question but like the "jitterbug" it plumb evades me....

 

Assume your inserting strips (name your flavor) into the pex tubing to make the arch... how do you install the arches in the ground?

If the strip is in the tube I dont see slipping the pex over a rod in the ground..

 

I'm hoping that someone can give me some insight...

 

Bob

What I've done is use a PVC tee at each end, and then I use a couple pieces of PVC off each tee to create legs.  I simply stake the legs and use 2 guy wires in the center of the arc to hold it upright.  If you glue your joints, the arc is still waterproof.  Works great and to store, I simply pull up the stakes, straigten out and hang in garage. 

[Denny]

I read a couple of posts about inserting light strips into PEX tubing. So having a 5m roll of SMD5050 (?) dumb light strip and a need to be in Home Depot tonight, I picked up a couple of pieces. I couldnt remember if I needed 1/2 or 3/4 so I picked up a little piece of both.

Inserted the strip into the 1/2" (fits very nicely) and lit it up .. Ok.. I like the look and more importantly.. SANDRA.. likes the look.. however she wants a smart strip and arches made out of it.. which brings me to my point...

What is a good way to get the strip into the PEX and keep the lights all pointing the same way (more or less)?
Keeping in mind that the strip I am playing with is one that is coated and has the adhesive strip on the back.
I would most likely, in production, be using the smart strips from Ray Wu which as I understand, are more block like in thier encasement ... like a LOR CCR(? )

Anyone else using or experimenting with light strips and PEX?

Bob

 

 

 

I realize this is an old thread, but one way to keep the strips straight and facing the same direction in PEX is to attach the strip to the metal plumbers tape (the metal stripping that wraps around the outside of pipe or duct work to hang it from joists).  The tape comes in a roll and you can attach the LED strip to the tape and slide it inside the PEX.

[boisechris]

Hello people,

I'm new to this forum as well as being new to extreme decorating  Please forgive my ignorance.

This will be my first year 2014...

I will be using LOR software and controllers for much of the display, but I understand many people use Ray Wu for CCR strips and CCP too.

My question is, if I buy thise CCP from Ray..which ones? (please add link) and where do you get the ends for them. I would like smart strips but have no idea how to control them without buying LOR plug and play ribbons. I've heard that San controllers are good but have no idea how you incorporate them into your LOR system.

I'm no electrician or programmer..lol..so please respond with layman terms...pleeeez.

 

Best,

Chris

[boisechris]

Anyone doing this on their house? Around windows? 

If you put pex on your gutters with CCR in it, how do you take turns etc?

[thevikester]

Hello people,

I'm new to this forum as well as being new to extreme decorating  Please forgive my ignorance.

This will be my first year 2014...

I will be using LOR software and controllers for much of the display, but I understand many people use Ray Wu for CCR strips and CCP too.

My question is, if I buy thise CCP from Ray..which ones? (please add link) and where do you get the ends for them. I would like smart strips but have no idea how to control them without buying LOR plug and play ribbons. I've heard that San controllers are good but have no idea how you incorporate them into your LOR system.

I'm no electrician or programmer..lol..so please respond with layman terms...pleeeez.

 

Best,

Chris

Chris, 

There is something called E1.31, E1.31 (also called Streaming ACN) is a protocol for sending DMX512 data over

the ACN...this is how LOR talks to your Sandevices controller.  You would have regular LOR channels, and then RGB channels in your sequence editor.  I'm at work so don't have the ability to walk you thru the process, but rest assured, its not that complicated...I thought it was going to be, so stayed away from it until last year, made the leap, and I do use Sandevice controllers, and I am very happy that I did.

As far as which ones to use from Ray, there is a whole host of choices. 5V to 12V, pixel bullets to strips, different IP ratings(look for 68 rated) which is suppose to be waterproof, but by our standards, really isn't the case, usually some extra sealing is needed if you live in a wet climate.     I was fortunate this year, live in Florida, and had 1 day of rain in 4 weeks, so had no issues this year with that.

there is another website called   www.auschristmaslighting.com   that will be a great place to look for RGB information in the forums , in the Learning Centre as they call it, there is a RGB 101 manual to look at, should be the RGB Newbie Bible, I keep a copy on my desktop of my computer, and my actual desktop!   Take a peek at that and it will really get you headed in the right direction.  I'm a finance guy, so I am not a programmer or electrician either. Heck, just learned to solder last year because of this hobby...

[jerry72]

I cant count how much PEX i installed when building homes, never would have thought it would lite up like that with LED lights inside of it. I was wondering how to do my arches this year and now I will think about that.

[thevikester]

I did strips with dryer duct vent over the top, and put the strips directly on 1 inch PVC...I took 4 inch plumbing pipe pvc, and cut thin rings from that...once cut, put a slice in the ringe so I could overlap the ring, as the dryer vent is 4 inches also, so it would be too snug.  Screwed the rings that I cut onto my 1 inch PVC from the bottom, at 7 different locations, and then pulled the dryer vent over my loops...diffused light beautifully...you don't see the rings underneath, and holds the dryer vent off of the light strip itself..  I liked the bigger arch lighting than the more narrow...but thats me, if fell more in line with the light emitted from wrapping the pvc from a surface perspective that I used to do.

 

I did get a few.."WTH are you doing" questions prior to them ever being turned on, but none of that once they saw the result...just anotherway to diffuse pixels, and very easy.

[Little_b]

Hey thevikester do you have any pics.  I'm having a hard time visualizing that.

[jerrymac]

Here is a link to an example I did with the same process as thevikester was describing.  From a distance you can not see the rings that are visible in the closeup in this video.  I used 3/4 pvc with  T's every 2 feet and a short piece of pvc with a "L" to hold the dryer vent hose so the lights were in the center (xip tied to the long pieces of 3/4 pvc). There is also a short piece on dumb pixels done with the same setup.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBEM4EHZ2J8

 

 

Hurrah  edit is back.  !!!!

Edited January 15, 2014 by jerrymac

[jerry72]

Here is a link to an example I did with the same process as thevikester was describing.  From a distance you can not see the rings that are visible in the closeup in this video.  I used 3/4 pvc with  T's every 2 feet and a short piece of pvc with a "L" to hold the dryer vent hose so the lights were in the center (xip tied to the long pieces of 3/4 pvc). There is also a short piece on dumb pixels done with the same setup.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBEM4EHZ2J8

 

 

Hurrah  edit is back.  !!!!

Looks good.

[bob_moody]

Since one of my posts was referenced, I thought I would update my results. We used 2 WS2811 strips to make 4 arches. My concerns about orientation.....unnecessary. Regardless of which what they point, the entire tube light up. I used 3/4" pex and I can say as a leaping arch....100% success. You can see examples in our videos on the website.

Http://moodychristmas.weebly.com

Bob

Edited January 16, 2014 by bob_moody

[thevikester]

Hey thevikester do you have any pics.  I'm having a hard time visualizing that.

Hey Little...I will take some this weekend and show you the inner working of the  arch set up. I know my description of what I did is hard to understand, it makes perfect sense to me because I did it. lol    I have it all over in storage right now..