Ebuechner Posted May 28, 2016 Share Posted May 28, 2016 I've been putting together the strips for my mega tree using 12 volt pixel nodes. I have them running in a test mode from xlights on the floor for about a week and I've noticed failures of two types. First type of failure would be losing one color on a node usually green. The second type of failure is the 2811 chip stop working and sending the signal on to the next node. I'm assuming at some point I can weed out most of the problem pixels but the question is is how long do I test and what are the best practices for testing. I've noticed if I test for a day or so then turn the pixels off for a couple hours when I turn them back on that's when I see the 2811 chip failure but it doesn't usually happen while the nodes are active. I'm trying to keep the problems to a minimum when I get to the point of putting the tree up and I would appreciate any input. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gsmith37064 Posted May 28, 2016 Share Posted May 28, 2016 I have the same exact issue with the nodes i purchased from Rays. I ended up scraping them on my ghosts, mini trees, and columns. And going back to RGB STRIPS for those. I still have a stray node that does that on my singing face. I am going to cut that node out and replace it as it's a pain to wire up the face. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
canadianchristmas Posted May 28, 2016 Share Posted May 28, 2016 See if this helps, turn your power supplies down to 11v, some of Rays pixels like the first gen technicolor's did not like a full 12v and would fry over time from it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ebuechner Posted May 28, 2016 Author Share Posted May 28, 2016 I'm using holiday Coro pixel nodes and I'm already running at 11.7 volts. With the scale that I'm running I'm expecting some failures but I'm hoping to weed them out before I put them in the display. I'm going to have 36 strings of 56 pixels in total and I'm testing 12 strips at a time Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
canadianchristmas Posted May 28, 2016 Share Posted May 28, 2016 (edited) 8 minutes ago, Ebuechner said: I'm using holiday Coro pixel nodes and I'm already running at 11.7 volts. With the scale that I'm running I'm expecting some failures but I'm hoping to weed them out before I put them in the display. I'm going to have 36 strings of 56 pixels in total and I'm testing 12 strips at a time You have seemed to have a LOT of failures already, I would say get in contact with Dave and hopefully he can help you troubleshoot it or have the faulty strings can be replaced under warranty. Edited May 28, 2016 by canadianchristmas Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ebuechner Posted May 28, 2016 Author Share Posted May 28, 2016 Of the strings that I'm testing now I have had 5 nodes fail out of 672. It would be unrealistic to expect a zero failure rate Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
George Simmons Posted May 28, 2016 Share Posted May 28, 2016 58 minutes ago, canadianchristmas said: ... I would say get in contact with Dave and hopefully he can help you troubleshoot it or have the faulty strings can be replaced under warranty. Warranty? HC? When did that start? I'd love to be a fly on the wall listening to that telephone conversation. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ebuechner Posted May 28, 2016 Author Share Posted May 28, 2016 1 hour ago, George Simmons said: Warranty? HC? When did that start? I'd love to be a fly on the wall listening to that telephone conversation. Here it goes again I don't know where this all started with holiday Coro but I've been treated more than fair. When I questioned the quality of the strips that he sells he more than helped me out without saying what the arrangement was all I can tell you it was way more than fair. One time I had a pixel give out on a project that I didn't have spares he sent me out a new pixel immediately. One time I emailed him to let him know that the mounting rings that he has on his 30-inch Stars left little rust marks on my house just so he knows what was going on when his product ages a little. He responded by sending me out a whole new set of stars and I wasn't asking for anything. I don't want to start a war I'm just letting you know what my experience has been 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gsmith37064 Posted May 28, 2016 Share Posted May 28, 2016 Only had 1 bad dealing with him on a bad power supply. But he did refund half of the price. Even cross shipped a new power supply in the mean time. Overall I have been treated fairly with HolidayCoro products as well. So i will continue to use him in the future. He was great getting on the phone with me and troubleshooting the AlphaPix16 issue. He was even going to send out a new controller but we found the issue and now i am waiting on a firmware update. But i wonder why George has it in for them???? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ebuechner Posted May 29, 2016 Author Share Posted May 29, 2016 I guess if no one has any input on testing pixels I'll just continue to do what I'm doing. So far I've only had 1 per 130 pixels go bad I'm not sure if that's average Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
George Simmons Posted May 30, 2016 Share Posted May 30, 2016 On 5/28/2016 at 2:34 PM, gsmith37064 said: But i wonder why George has it in for them???? I have total disrespect for ANY/ALL vendors who don't treat their customers right. When I was a newbie, the old timers cared enough to point out vendors who might not be ones a person would want to do business with. I'm simply paying that forward. I've been around synchronized lighting since 2008, and in that time I've never heard of any vendor who's even close to HC regarding the number of disgruntled and mal-treated customers. I feel that information is important to share with people who don't yet know their way around this hobby. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ebuechner Posted May 30, 2016 Author Share Posted May 30, 2016 George I don't want you to be upset with me but I do understand Dave's position at holiday Coro maybe a little more than some other's in the Forum. I own my own business and it seems as though I'm the bad guy every day when a customer just can't get their way. I own a convenience store and Daily someone wants us to ignore the law or sell them something cheaper than anyone else gets it after all they don't care if we're in business tomorrow they just want their way today. These people go out and badmouth you for using common sense. For instance one gentleman wanted me to give him $48 because he said we sold him bad gas. He was upset when we stated the facts. 1 the gas is run through filters they clean out any particulates and react to any water. And number two (and this is the big one) we buy gas 8000 gallons at a time if the gas was bad I wouldn't get a call from just one person. He turned around and gave a bad review on Google. What was I to do give in to his demands? I had to hold to my principles. I don't doubt that with the volume that holiday Coro does that they haven't been able to please everybody. and I'm sure some people who have burnt out components from their own negligence and then couldn't get it warrantied were complaining on the forums without stating all of the facts. I do appreciate the fact that you're trying to look out for people but I read as many good things as I have bad things about holiday Coro. But admittedly I haven't been doing this as long as you and so far my dealings with them have been positive even when I had problems Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gsmith37064 Posted May 30, 2016 Share Posted May 30, 2016 I have hardly seen any bad reviews against Holidaycoro if any on here. I had the one experience with the power supply but he did refund half the price of it. Was I mad? Of course... But other than that i have bought so many items over the year from Dave without issue. He has treated me fair over all. And i will buy from him again just like i will buy again from LOR. But if you had issues back in 2008 George... Things change because i just don't see the evil you do. "Can't we all just get along?" 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
greenie95125 Posted May 31, 2016 Share Posted May 31, 2016 I have no issues with HC either. They sell a "similar" product at a greatly reduced cost. I'm sure his margins are thin hence the shorter warranty time frame, and paid support options. Sure, LOR has awesome customer support and a fabulous warranty, but we pay for it in equipment and software costs. HC got me on board with pixels, and for that I'm thankful. LOR supplied the 64 channels of AC control and the software to run it all, and for that I'm thankful as well. Mike Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jerry72 Posted June 4, 2016 Share Posted June 4, 2016 Out of 600 nodes, i had not one failure. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ebuechner Posted June 12, 2016 Author Share Posted June 12, 2016 I'm now testing the nodes at just above 10 volts as canadianchristmas suggested the white still looks good and everything functions perfectly we'll see if that eliminates any 2811 chip failures. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
uncledan Posted June 12, 2016 Share Posted June 12, 2016 I didn't break in anything last year. 5,000+ dumb nodes and approximately 5,000 bullet and square pixels purchased from Holiday Coro last year. I could count the failures on one hand (possibly one finger) throughout the whole lighting season. Not worth my time "breaking in" with failure rates that low Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PhilMassey Posted June 12, 2016 Share Posted June 12, 2016 I use Ray's 12V square epoxy filled IP68 pixels. I ran about 1000 last season without a single failure. About half of those were also used the previous year too. I also have about 500 of them semi permanently set up in by basement, which have been in use probably 5 hours a week for close to 2 yeas. No failures there either. That's probably done it, they'll all fail tonight. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ebuechner Posted June 12, 2016 Author Share Posted June 12, 2016 Everything seems to be happy at 10.5 volts even the dimming curve seems better. I think this batch of nodes just likes the lower voltage. I haven't had this problem with any of the other RGB elements that I have. I'm using short runs of 16 gauge wire on these nodes so there isn't very much voltage drop Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
k6ccc Posted June 13, 2016 Share Posted June 13, 2016 Other than an initial test to make sure they work, I've never done any break in testing on pixels. For the 600 Ray Wu square node pixels on my pixel tree, they have now been used for four years.. First and second years there were zero failures, third year there were less than six, and last year there were two. The one mistake I did make us that I bought no spares. Fortunately a forum member here sent me some exact replacements when the first couple failed so I didn't have to order some more from Ray and wait for them to arrive from China while my show was running... I expect to get at least one more year out of them before the tree rebuild that is again being pushed back a year... Sent from my Droid Turbo via Tapatalk, so blame any typos or spelling errors on Android Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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