Rope Lighting

[friskybri]

I have all sorts of questions on lighting. I have alot of rope lighting and was wondering if anyone uses them to outline the house. Run up the sides and across the top of the roof. I was wanting to put up red, green, blue and white. Any idea if they show really good or no? Or do you think I should use mini's?

[Paul Roberson]

My roof line and windows are outlined in rope light. Red, green, blue, and clear.

I have made frames for the windows and put rope light channel on them and the rope light stays on the frame all the time. I have made some brackets with the rope light channels attached to them that hang on the gudder.

I have some pictures posted somewhere or on my computer. When I find them I will post them

is not good enough to give you a good idea as to what it will look like, but there is r,g,b,c rope light on the roof line and windows.

[friskybri]

I look foward to seeing them. I want to put four strands R,G,B,W acrost the top but dont know what to use to secure them. Do you lay them flat next to each other? Also wanted to keep them up off the roof alittle bit do to snow. Anyone have ideas on that.

[Paul Roberson]

I could not find the pictures. So I took some more.

I used rope light track from here


Attached files

[Paul Roberson]

Here is the gutter

Attached files

[friskybri]

What did you make the gutter brackets out of? Those are really nice. This gives me a a great start to my planning. The rope lights came with plastic clips that I could use and drill holes on the metal peace that will keep them a few inches off of my roof. That way when it snows it wont be covered up.

[Paul Roberson]

friskybri wrote:

What did you make the gutter brackets out of? Those are really nice. This gives me a a great start to my planning. The rope lights came with plastic clips that I could use and drill holes on the metal peace that will keep them a few inches off of my roof. That way when it snows it wont be covered up.

The gutter brackets are made out of a 1/2" x 6' piece of flat aluminum. They are cut and bent into the "L" shape with a "hook" bent into the top part to hang on the gutter. The bottom is bent and cut is just long enough to rest on the fascia board and keep the rope light channels facing the viewing area instead of at the ground. I have riveted 4' rope light channel to the brackets.

It would take a whole bunch of those plastic clips, or the rope light will sag in between each clip.

[Madhatter]

You're using plastic channel to put the rope in to keep it straight.
Rope light is excellent stuff, you can cut it join it split it, with y L and X. You can cut it mid section and splice it too and I've even replaced lamps in it but you need the right bits and equipment. Plan was to outline a block of flats with it this year and have rows going down and accross, unfortunately it's not happened so can't show you. but my advice is use it. it is power hungry though.

[Paul Roberson]

I agree it is power hungry, and in the case of the rope light I had the blue was awful. When the blue was on it looked green!!!

I have replaced my blue and red incandescent rope light with LED rope light. I plan on replacing the green and white next year.

Last year I could not run my red, green, blue, and clear on one 30 amp controller the load was too much. All of them on full pulled over 38 amps. This year with the change of 2 colors to LEDs my rope light amp draw is 23.76 total.

[friskybri]

how many ropes did you have connected together? I am looking at 5 18' ropes per color.

[Paul Roberson]

I got mine in 150' rolls. In all it totals just under 850'.

My longest single run this year is about 33'

I added more controllers this year and have the roofline split into 5 sections.

Last year the longest rope light length was about 135'

[friskybri]

so at 135 feet what was the amp pull on that one. My rope light is for effect on the outline of the roof. 4, 90 foot runs, not all will be on at the same time. I need to go get a watt meter.

[Paul Roberson]

friskybri wrote:

so at 135 feet what was the amp pull on that one. My rope light is for effect on the outline of the roof. 4, 90 foot runs, not all will be on at the same time. I need to go get a watt meter.

I can't remember exactly, somewhere between 7 and 8 amps I think.

[Madhatter]

Thought your rope light was like ours, cut to the metre?

You should have an amps per metre, ours in the uk is 16.4 watts per metre / 230 volt = 0.0713043478 amps x 100 for a roll = 7.13043478 amps per 100 metre.

Yours appears to be per foot, and is either 3.36 or 5.5 watts per foot, so at 3.36 watts per foot /110= 0.0305454545 amps x 135 feet = 4.12363636.

I must say i'm quite jealous of you having rope in feet instead of metres, a metre is a lot more difficult to get to fit than a foot.

[Paul Roberson]

Madhatter wrote:

Thought your rope light was like ours, cut to the metre?

You should have an amps per metre, ours in the uk is 16.4 watts per metre / 230 volt = 0.0713043478 amps x 100 for a roll = 7.13043478 amps per 100 metre.

Yours appears to be per foot, and is either 3.36 or 5.5 watts per foot, so at 3.36 watts per foot /110= 0.0305454545 amps x 135 feet = 4.12363636.

I must say i'm quite jealous of you having rope in feet instead of metres, a metre is a lot more difficult to get to fit than a foot.

I am sure all our rope light comes from the same country:X


Mine is also cut to the meter. I however don't measure in meters!! So my measurement may not be exact.

[CLD Kevin]

My rope light from http://www.actionlighting.com is 5.5 watts or 0.046 amps per ft. It comes in 150ft rolls for a total of 7amps. It can be cut at every 18 inches for the 1/2inch 2-wire rope. All the specs you need are on the site.

[Madhatter]

Paul, it may well do, but china do rope light in 12v 24v 110v 120v 230v 240v, in one channel 1 metre, 2 channel 2 metre, 3/8 inch, 1/2 inch, LED and incandecent round, oval, square, spiral, not forgetting the LED flat rgb, in every colour, bi colour tri colour and quad colour in the rainbow. I was amazed at the range that was available. Something I've not seen for a while is the fibre optical stuff that was available to outline buildings, had a projector at each end.
But anyway, you aren't the only one to measure it by the foot, the sites selling it do too which is why I assumed china must make the 110/120v in foot lengths for usa.
I'd love to come over there and visit you're displays, see whats available, what you use and how,

A request to all you rope lighters out there... do you know where I can get hold of some mid metre end caps and the joining flex? thats the end caps with the tube up the side to take the flex.