dc cards

[movieman4]

Hello , does every dc card needs his own power supply or can i put 2 or 3 dc cards to 1 power supply?

i am just a newbie sorry.

[cmurray]

I only run one DC card, but it is all based on the load that you are going to draw on the DC channels. If the power supply is large enough to handle the total load plus a bit more so you are not maxing out the supply between all the cards they should be able to all be wired in parallel to the DC supply.

 

Someone may correct me if I am incorrect but the determining factor should just be the load.

 

CMurray

[Geoff Harvey]

I run quite a few DC cards. I use 350W DC power supplies. For most power supplies, I run 2 or 3 cards from each power supply. In my case, the number of DC cards / supply depends not only on the total current draw, but also on the physical locations of the cards and the dc voltage required. (Because of my mix of lights, I run several DC voltages 12, 24, 27, & 30).

[Ken Benedict]

I cram as big a power supply as I can into a weatherproof case; it loafs along and does not overheat.

 

I also prefer the brand Mean Well for the supplies; better built IMHO.

[movieman4]

ok ,so i need to figer out how much load i have on the dc cards and i can connect them all to a power supllie big enough to handle the load.

I will put all my cards into a central closet thats waterproof and big enough.

[Ken Benedict]

ok ,so i need to figer out how much load i have on the dc cards and i can connect them all to a power supllie big enough to handle the load.

I will put all my cards into a central closet thats waterproof and big enough.

 

The downside to that is the amount of cords that will be traveling out to your yard; lots of them.

 

Most people install the controller and power supply in a weatherproof enclosure and put it the location where it's most used.

 

Some people buy it ready to go: http://store.creativelightingdisplays.com/CMB24D-RGB-DC-Controller-ReadyToGO-No-Assembly-CMB24D-RGB-RTG.htm

[nam1956]

Been searching for people using the DC cards and am soooo happy to find some here. I'm new to LOR but have been glued to the screen since I found it. I think I much prefer DC lights, I say think because I don't have any (in fact new to this hobby) but I work with DC voltage in my daily life as a phone man. My plans have at least two parts and each will have many little features, I started looking at "light shows" for landscaping reasons and once I get a good feeling for them I will be lighting two yard ponds, waterfalls and a simulated underwater spring with lights I can control and/or sync to the background music.

 Soo I have a couple of questions about DC lights and on.

 

Can RGB be used with DC?

Is/what is the loop limit from a controller to the first light/element

I have noticed that the software talks through a serial connection to the controller, but the controllers are linked together via a data network, can that network be a shared network, does the speed of the network 10/100 or gig help, hurt or even affect the operation

 

For the landscaping part of my project I had planned to mount all of my controllers in a location in my basement with all of my other voice, data and sound wiring. I will have pipe buried to put low voltage wire in with boxes in the yard around the ponds and the other features needing lighting and then wire the lights from those boxes. The junction boxes will be hidden in bushes, under decks and so on. This part of the project is permanent, lights, controllers, and wire will all be in a fixed location and never will be moved.

  Since I will be investing in this equipment I decided to convert my holiday light also. At the very least I would like to locate most of the controllers for the lights on the house in the basement as mentioned above and run wire to each set of lights on the house. This may sound like a bunch of wiring but I'm a telephone man. wire is for the best part free as is my labor. My intent is to make as much as possible permanent, if there was a way the strip lighting could remain mounted under the gutters and around the windows I would love it. But even if I have to mount the lights each year I will at least have all the wire concealed in the walls of the house with only a plug were needed for the lights.

 

  Now I'm bettin that all of the experienced lighters here will shoot all sorts of holes in my plans, which is good because I have not dug all of these holes for the pipe nor have any of the wires fished into the walls yet.

[Geoff Harvey]

Been searching for people using the DC cards and am soooo happy to find some here. I'm new to LOR but have been glued to the screen since I found it. I think I much prefer DC lights, I say think because I don't have any (in fact new to this hobby) but I work with DC voltage in my daily life as a phone man. My plans have at least two parts and each will have many little features, I started looking at "light shows" for landscaping reasons and once I get a good feeling for them I will be lighting two yard ponds, waterfalls and a simulated underwater spring with lights I can control and/or sync to the background music.

 Soo I have a couple of questions about DC lights and on.

 

Can RGB be used with DC?

Yes

Is/what is the loop limit from a controller to the first light/element

I have noticed that the software talks through a serial connection to the controller, but the controllers are linked together via a data network, can that network be a shared network, does the speed of the network 10/100 or gig help, hurt or even affect the operation

There are several coms options:

• Standard LOR protocol which uses RS484 for communication
• DMX run over similar cabling
• and DMX on Ethernet

While most users use cat 5 cabling for the standard LOR and DMX protocols, they are not running Ethernet and each of the controllers is linked in series. If my memory serves me correctly, the standard LOR network can be up to 2-300 metres while running RS484. I have no experience using the DMX or DMX on ethernet networks. 

 

For the landscaping part of my project I had planned to mount all of my controllers in a location in my basement with all of my other voice, data and sound wiring. I will have pipe buried to put low voltage wire in with boxes in the yard around the ponds and the other features needing lighting and then wire the lights from those boxes. The junction boxes will be hidden in bushes, under decks and so on. This part of the project is permanent, lights, controllers, and wire will all be in a fixed location and never will be moved.

  Since I will be investing in this equipment I decided to convert my holiday light also. At the very least I would like to locate most of the controllers for the lights on the house in the basement as mentioned above and run wire to each set of lights on the house. This may sound like a bunch of wiring but I'm a telephone man. wire is for the best part free as is my labor. My intent is to make as much as possible permanent, if there was a way the strip lighting could remain mounted under the gutters and around the windows I would love it. But even if I have to mount the lights each year I will at least have all the wire concealed in the walls of the house with only a plug were needed for the lights.

 

  Now I'm bettin that all of the experienced lighters here will shoot all sorts of holes in my plans, which is good because I have not dug all of these holes for the pipe nor have any of the wires fished into the walls yet.

I like your ideas and believe it is all relatively easy to do. I assume all your lighting fixtures will be LED and thus have low power requirements. In Australia, most landscape lighting is 12V (I think). The LOR DC boards operate with a common +ve connection with all switching on the individual -ve connections. For many of my lights, I run a common +ve connection to the actual light strings. This allows fewer wiring runs, but depending on your current demands, the common return may need to have a higher current capacity. For holiday lighting, many users are starting to follow the RGB pixel route where individual controls are used for every bulb. (LOR's items in this field are CCRs & CCBs). A more comprehensive manual on lighting and controller options can be found on the ACL forums site at http://auschristmaslighting.com/forums/index.php .  (To download the manual, you need to be registered on the forum - manual link http://auschristmaslighting.com/forums/index.php/topic,1889.0.html 

Edited January 19, 2014 by Geoff Harvey

[scubado]

nam 1956:  My setup is exactly what your wanting to do minus the ponds.  I have two LOR DC controllers that run my high powered led floods and several DMX controllers to run my rgb ribbons in my flowerbeds.  I also have two AC controllers in basement as part on the permanent setup, the rest go outside closer to the elements.

[nam1956]

Thanks to both of you, you have provided a lot more info and a little reassurance that my plans are reachable and that my head is in the right place instead of about waist high as my Wife is thinking. In my old age I'm getting a little lazy I guess and want to keep the yearly work load down. As mentioned my first and main need is the landscaping and would love to be able to sync the lights in and around the ponds to soft music. If I ever get this project done I will be able to roll my death bed out to the deck and relax for once.

  This project was originally planned to be a 4 year project, in the first year I have about 120' of the retaining walls up, a one deck (of two), about 40' of natural stone wall (each rock weighing 100 to 1500 lbs each and close to 96 yards of dirt and gravel moved around the yard. I rented a bobcat to grade the yard and am totally redoing the entire place so digging the trenches for pipe was already in the plan because of the other plans like water pipes, AC outlets and drainage so adding a 2' pipe for DC will not be a problem.

 

 

I'm thinkin I will be able to drop a cat 5/6, a common ground and power lead at any non permanent location, if more than one element is located at a drop I will place a small Ethernet switch to handle the controllers. I can hid these locations in small (deco) buildings I will be placing, like a Light house near my ponds (of course the light house will be lit)

 

Thanks again and you can bet I'll be asking more questions yet. As I go I will post pics of the project, it will be a little different than most projects here (non holiday) but with the advice provided here I'm sure it will be beautiful, If not I may be moving in with some new friends here cause the wife will be pissed.

 

Thanks again

Neal

[scubado]

Just be sure not to run data lines with AC circuits!  My back is sore just reading your post!

Edited January 19, 2014 by scubado

[Max-Paul]

Hi Nam1956,

I see your somewhere near St. Louis if not in it. I am a wee bit west of you out in Warrenton. I am still not sure if you understand that the LOR controllers do not talk Ethernet and damage can happen if you try to put the LOR network cable on an Ethernet switch. LOR is using Ethernet Cat 5 cables cause they are so easy to get made up to different lengths. LOR is selling to non-tech people who do not have the tools or knowledge to make their own Cat 5 cables. But there are a good number of us who do know how to make our own cables.

 

Now as to the low voltage issues. I see you plan to put some of your power supplies a bit of a distance from the lights or the power supply and controllers will be a bit from the lights. Just keep this in mind. The further away from the lights you are the more voltage drop you will have. Unless you use a bigger sized wire (Physically). And that can get to be costly. Can you while landscaping build some form of fake tree trunk and hide a power supply and controller in that, close to the lights?

 

BTW where abouts in STL are you?

 

Paul

[Ken Benedict]

Nam1956: As you pull your wires in conduit, pull an extra fish cable along with the data cables so it's easy to upgrade in the future.

 

Also, the LOR AC controllers work best with the "bootless" connectors so they can fit easily into the controllers.

And as described above, the LOR network is not normally a Star network, but a Daisy Chain without completing the loop.

[nam1956]

Paul I am in O Fallon MO. not far at all from you. Thanks for the info also. I am in telecommunications and have very little problem getting wire free or at greatly reduced priced so the cost of wire does not bother me (yet). For the seasonal lights I will be installing I plan on installing underground pipe to select locations in the yard and installing a small junction box and a prop of some kind that will house the seasonal controllers for the lights not attached to the house. I at this point are planning to pull 2- cat5 cables a common ground and a power lead to every box, hoping that will (depending on the power tap) power the controllers and lights in each location.

 Want to run this by you also, would standard voice cable (22 ga) power or control singe pixels, ( I would like to mess with/build a light board) I have up to 100 pr cables (200 conductors) with quick connect plugs that would be great if they would work.

 

Thanks again

Neal

[Max-Paul]

What is it about O'Falon? We have or had quite a few guys doing lights in that area. First I have to say that by code and good practice you do not want to run your cat 5 cables and 110VAC wires in the same conduit. Also you run the risk of the noise of the A.C. getting on your cat5 cables and screwing up the signal to the point that lights are going to do strange things and not what you want them to do.

As for the 22ga wire and pixel? Not real clear what you are asking. Mind you that when you say pixel, many of us here are thinking RGB and maybe with one of the decode chips such as the WS2811 chip. So, could you draw another picture of what you are doing so I can get it through my thick German skull? Knee jerk reaction is that 22 ga is rather small and depending on the distance might have to much IR voltage drop.

[nam1956]

Bear me out here cause I'm new, I have been pagin through the manual you posted the link to so I may make sense or I may cause extreme confusion. By pixel I am referring to what I would describe as a smart RGB bulb (three color single bulb). If there is really one of these I would hope to build a light board (my term I think) I would place and wire each bulb, the way I am picturing it is that I would need three control leads and power to each bulb. Distance would be less than 20, for this application. After rereading this I'm thinkin that a smart RGB string would be the same thing  or at least achieve the same thing, correct?

 I'm aware of the AC bleeding and the code about AC and low voltage in the same pipe.

 

Thanks

[scubado]

I strongly suggest you read this,  this will give you a better understanding of the different technologies to help steer you in the right direction.

 

http://auschristmaslighting.com/forums/index.php/topic,1211.0.html

[nam1956]

Okay, I have read it along with almost all of the manual for LOR. No surprises so far, Thanks it was useful in terms used here. Just to help you all gauge my skills (if that is the right word for them) I am a PBX (fone) tech. I started as a wiring tech, I have wired everything from a cave (2 mile of cable 7 phones) to the McDonald Douglas [(now Boing) 26,000 phones] Saint Louis location. Once out of cable I started with 1A2 mechanical systems and as time went on work on everything from semi-electronic, electronic, digital and VOIP systems. For the last 25 years I have installed and maintained phone systems across the mid-west, I have done command line programing although most interfaces for the last 15 years have been gooey. I currently maintain the entire voice/data network of eastern Missouri of Birch Telcom. I am  manufacturer certified on the OSI model, convergent technologies, Nortel routers and many more. I have a 25 user location Ethernet network with 3 wireless routers zoned for my smart phones, smart TV and young gamers in my home

 With that said I am a wire guy, a DIY person, I'm not trying to brag or anything like that, just trying to inform those trying to help me what I have done before coming here. Even though I was required to attend all of the training classes listed above I used very little of it on a daily basis, nice to know but hard to remember.

 

 

I have learned quite a bit so far (just a couple of days) and have a plan falling together, at least in my head. I want to use the E1.31 and a star topology. I have not yet determined how the network/s will lay out though. I will be installing a  new separate network for the lights because my current network is loaded, but is there an advantage of breaking my light elements out into different networks. ie:  Christmas/Seasonal and landscaping?  My landscaping will be in use year round and the seasonal of course would be seasonal. If elements are on different networks can I include elements from either network in any sequence?

 

Most importantly to me is the wiring, I'm one that will overdo things just to assure my self that regardless of what I ad or change later the basics to support that change is in place. My wife rightfully so thinks I'm a freakin nut because of it. My response "To bad". I am 58 and looking at retirement around the corner, I am building a retreat in my back yard which I will become part of once finished. I plan on it being perfect, to get there it needs lighting so here I am.  In rereading this not only is it getting long but like me it has a lot of different  things going on at one time.

 

One thing I an concerned about is what I think I may use for the seasonal elements. When my landscaping in compete I will have 3 yard ponds 1 in the front yard one in the side yard connected to the one in the back yard each the size of a average bedroom, at each of the ponds I will be installing Deco, miniature cabins, lighthouses ect. to house the equipment needed to filter and pump the water along with AC outlets. Is there a problem with placing a E1.331 to DMX  (4 universe) converter in this housings and leaving them there. The housings will be weather proof but will get might cold and hot. So to setting up the seasonal display would just be plug and play of the elements.

 

Go ahead hit me with it, don't pull any punches, tell me I'm a freakin nut, just include if I'm headed in the right direction

[scubado]

Will your ponds freeze over?  I've always wanted to freeze rgb floods in the ice.  I haven't worked with E1.31 yet, but it sounds like you are heading in the right direction.  I build my own landscape light fixtures and floods.  I order my leds from Ebay from china.  You're going to be the envy of everyone here with your connections to getting wire!  My best suggestion for you at this point is use stranded wire.  It's best not to solder anything larger than 18g wire to rgb ribbons.  16g wire is very easy to bridge across connections, best if you pigtail 18g to 16g if you have a long run.

[nam1956]

Thanks Scubado, All of the ponds I have built in the past do in fact freeze, most of the lights will be just above water level around the edge of the pond. The two ponds hooked together will share one large filter and are hooked together with underground piping. I will be pumping 6000 gph (gallons per hour) through the filters from the bottom pond to the top pond. The intakes in both ponds are underwater pipes, (Spring like) I plan on putting lights in those intakes creating a dim light under water. My lights on the two or three waterfalls will built into the waterfalls so the water flows over the lights. In the past I have ran the pumps for the waterfalls to produce cascading formations with any luck I will post pics next winter.

 

I'm interested in your Ideas on outdoor fixtures, I will have several around the yard and have the need to secure them into the ground because of the kids in the area (worried about them disappearing).