Dimming LED light strips - a lot of them!

[Nad]

Hi all,

I've got a requirement to have dimming control over nearly 110m of high output 5630 LED strip lights (the plan is not to run them at 100% but do so if required). They run at 30W per meter so looking at around 3300W (plus an additional 20% as not to run the drivers at 100% load) of total power that is required. Admittedly they are not all connected together but some rooms will have around 25m of the stuff. It will be used as mood lighting when dimmed down and supplement general room lighting when not dimmed so low.

I was wondering if anyone had any ideas on the best way to power and control them? At the moment I'm looking at using a bunch of these Triac LED Dimming Drivers connected to QLD outputs but it is starting to look like a rather expensive option considering each one is only 150w and I'm looking at needing atleast 27 of these.

Thanks,
Nad

P.S. I'm beginning to realise that the practicalities of using such high power LEDs may cause more problems than they are worth ...

[M.Harrison]

Hi - Not sure if you've sorted this yet or if this helps... I've got a number of the RGB coloured strips that are beyond the limit of the driver unit. To sort this I bought a couple of "driver" units from e-bay - These allow you to supply them with the driving signal and supply each driver with it's own power. although you'd need quite a few of them they are significantly cheaper than the one you listed above. example driver - http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/LED-RGB-Si...kAAOSwymxVRkPK there are several different suppliers - this was the first I came across...

[neilhooper]

I've been doing this for the last four years using a combination of QRI's, QAO's, LT-393-5A's and the unit in the above post. It's quite a long and drawn out explanation of how to do it but it is VERY possible and completely scalable. If you haven't got it sorted let mo know and I'll post it.

- Neil.

[M.Harrison]

Neil,
I'd like to hear how you've got it working even if Nad doesn't need the info... I've not got mine linked to the Idranet/ Cortex and would love to have control that way, been trying to bodge it via an IR solution .. but it's not really worked out ..

[neilhooper]

Neil,
I'd like to hear how you've got it working even if Nad doesn't need the info... I've not got mine linked to the Idranet/ Cortex and would love to have control that way, been trying to bodge it via an IR solution .. but it's not really worked out ..

Are you wanting to do white or RGB or both. I do both but mainly RGB (currently running at 50m and counting) and the explanation is different for either type.

- Neil

[chris_j_hunter]

wondered if the Philips Hue approach might be an alternative - all-in, how would the costs & ease of integration with Cortex compare ? We've used LED tape in a few places, and have had reliability issues - used externally under a canopy, individual elements started to fail after about a year (only 15% of them now glow): above my workbench it seems the driver has failed; and under tha handrails on our lower stairs, left & right colours don't match ...

[M.Harrison]

Neil - fundamentaly it's for RGB strips. Currently don't have any white only ones - though that may change in the future...
Chris - Not familiar with the Philips product but so far haven't had any failures on the strips. Although they are outdoor grade mine are only used indoors... They are in the cornice round the main bedroom so don't get a huge amount of use. Which may be why no problems.....

[chris_j_hunter]

http://www.automatedhome.co.uk/vbull...52-Philips-Hue

[Karam]

http://www.automatedhome.co.uk/vbull...52-Philips-Hue

Integration of the Philips Hue bulbs is possible using the Cortex WebAPI. E.g.:

http://www.automatedhome.co.uk/vbull...ll=1#post25522

We did actually get some with a view to adding native integration (i.e a dedicated Cortex object) but this is on the back burner for the moment. You need the bulbs themselves and a hub through which they then communicate to the outside world (meaning to apps, Cortex or anything which might want to control them). I am led to believe anecdotally that this process or perhaps the comms between the bulbs and the hub are not entirely glitch free but have no personal experience and haven't really looked into.

[M.Harrison]

Neil - getting back to the RGB strips and controlling them.... Could you let me know how you managed to set it up as I'd very much like to do mine...