Hobby LOR Older Boards

[Guest guest]

:happytree:

I have read so much lately about LOR and I have 4 older hobby boards that I acquired about 2-3 years ago.

I'm in love with Carsons setup with TSO and a lot of the others with their displays. I have decided to try and attempt a computer lighted display. Since my boards are older I do not have the dimmer effect but that will be ok for the first year, I want to put them to good use for this season coming up and then add from there if it works out!

I keep running into this age old question?

How many lights can I put on each channel, my boxes have 4 double plug outlets around the 3 sides of the plastic container.

Also what is the safe distance I can run the Cat5 cable from the computer to the first box and what is the distance from there on between each additional box?

As a general rule I have a max of the 3-100 light sets in a row for the mini trees and light sets that run in groups of 6 different colors that are also 3 - 100 sets long zipped together.

Also to answer another possible question I use Target and Walmart light sets!

:waycool:

Also how are people setting up their lights for the ground effect in grids?

Any information would be qreatly appreciated.

:] Mike

Deltona

[Guest guest]

Without knowing more about the controllers you are using, it would be very hard for anyone here to make anything short of a wild guess as to what these controllers could handle. From what you describe, they are not LOR boards, but another brand/style of controller.

[Guest guest]

Deltona wrote:

[sNIP] Since my boards are older I do not have the dimmer effect but that will be ok for the first year [sNIP]
How many lights can I put on each channel, my boxes have 4 double plug outlets around the 3 sides of the plastic container.

All LOR cards have dimming. Do you have a model number off the card?

Thanks
Dan

[Guest guest]

Sorry Guys,

I made a mistake they were old Dasher boards 8 channel!

But my questions still remain the same



:laughing: Mike

Deltona

[Guest guest]

I don't think the Dasher boards could dim but I know LOR can control them.

[Guest guest]

I have put 2 amps (per channel) through my old Dasher boards without any problems. I have heat sinks on them, so they would probably take more. The will not do dimming, I use mine for animation on/off only. The only problems I have is the communication signal will not travel long distances, so I keep them grouped close together.

[Guest guest]

Thanks Bill,

Now I just have to figure out what 2 amps equals to in 100 light sets.

What have you come up with in distances that work for the older boards, and the ones that I have put together are going on with heat sinks.

I have a total of 4 boards to work with for this year so giving me a total of 32 channels.

Also how far is Athens from Cleveland?

Thanks again,

:laughing: Mike

[Guest guest]

You can estimate that 3 sets of 100ct minis are going to be 1 amp. As far as distance for the Dasher boards, I kind of forget. There were very involved discussions on this very subject a few years ago, but I forget the results. I have the printouts somewhere in my stacks of archives, but I have never got around to putting them in order. :shock: Two years ago, I ran 11 boards, and for some reason the communication wouldn't do 12. I'm thinking it was around 700'. Last year, I mounted some of the Dasher boards on a garage wall, the daisy chained communcation cables were only a foot long (each), and I ran 14 boards with no problems. The problem was that I had to use lots of zip cord, to run to the animation, but the good thing was that the boards didn't cost much to make. I actually bought a rs232 line booster, but I never did try it, at the time, zip cord was cheap, so I went that way.

I am about 4 hours from Cleveland.

[Guest guest]

I'm going to try and do a small setup in the house connecting what I call a gang of lights. These are a zipped group of 6 different colored 100 set lights and put back to back making them 300 lights long and I have 2 identical sets like this. I should be able to set these 2 sets of lights on one board and still have one outlet available for something else.

My boards are set inside a plastic container and I have 4 double plugged outlets on 3 sides of the container this leaves me 1 pair of outlets on the first board to work with something else.

I built something like Darryls, christmas trees 8' high and I have 2 of these trees with 4 - 100 gold lights on the main struts and a 50 light set for the star and the rest of the tree is set with blue lights I have forgotten how many blue lights I run on this tree but they are 3 - 100 sets long, so I'm going to try and get a tree on each board not to overload anything.

We here in Florida do not get real cold nights a few but I do not want to tax the boards even though they will be outside in the cooler air even with a heat sink.

I have tried to get back into the swing of decorating since 2004's 3 hurricanes but it has not been easy getting back into the swing of it.

These boards were purchased in the spring of 2004 just before the storms and have yet to be used.

We hope to go to Cleveland in June or July so we might look you up!

:laughing: Mike

[Guest guest]

Mike,

Sounds like a cool project. Be sure to post some pics when you get to that point. Also, check out the thread about the Ohio Mini Plus, if it comes together, you might be interested in attending. I haven't been much help in planning lately, but my job should slow down in a couple of weeks, so I'm hoping to have more input.