How to Install LED Strip Light
LED strip light is gradually emerging in the decoration industry because of its light, energy saving, soft, long life (the normal lifespan is between 80,000 and 100,000 hours), safety and other characteristics. However, as the LED strip light is a new product, a common question for those who have just come in contact with LEDs is "How to install LED strip lights?"
This process is very simple even if you don't know enough about electronic products, this project can be completed as a DIY project. Think ahead of time what you need, you can use LED strip lights to do anything!
Classification of LED strip lights
First of all, we should learn more about LED strip light which can help us choose and use it. From the LED specification of the strip light, familiar ones are 5050LED, 3528LED, 0603LED and 3020LED. From the hardness of LED strip lights, it can be divided into flexible LED strip light and hard LED strip light.
The flexible LED strip light uses FPC to make the assembly line, and are assembled with LED. It is as thin as a coin and is very space-saving. Because flexible LED strip can be cut so you may shear or lengthen at your will and shines as usual. Because FPC’s material is very soft, it may bend, fold, and coiled willfully. So they can be used in the irregular place and the spatial narrow and small place. Also because it can be random curved and coiled, they can be used to create any shape you need and popularly used in the advertisement decoration.
LED hard strip uses PCB as assembling circuit board. It has LED assembly and also has straight inserted LED assembly, different components for different necessary. Advantages of the hard strip are relative, such as easy to fix. The shortcomings of hard LED strip are cannot be bent arbitrarily, not suitable for the irregular place.
This blog mainly introduces the installation of the flexible strip light.
Installation of LED strip light
Step 1: Determine the length of the strip light you want to install
Generally, the strip lights are cut into units. Different brand may have different units. Taking sunnest as an example, the LED strips can be cut every 3 LEDs for flexible installation. The circuit will not be affected unless it is cut off from the shear mouth. If it is cut off at will, a unit will not be bright.
Step 2: Connect plugs
Connect led lights with dedicated plugs. First aiming the contact pin at the wire and then push the pin forward to connect to the wire. Don’t forget to cover the tail plug to prevent leakage of electricity at last.
Step 3: Set up the LED strip light
The strip light is packaged on reel. The newly opened lamp belt will distort and is not easy to install. It can be arranged first and then put into the light through.
Indoor and outdoor installations are slightly different in this step. When the LED light belt is used for interior decoration, the installation is very simple because it does not have to be subjected to wind and rain. When installing, you can directly tear off the sticker on the 3M double-sided adhesive surface, and then fix the lamp strip to the place where it needs to be installed and then press it flat with your hand. As for outdoor installation, the LED strip will fall off after a long period of time if fixed with 3M adhesive since the strip light will be exposed to wind and rain. So the outdoor installation is usually fixed with a slot. And additional waterproof adhesive is needed to consolidate the waterproof effect of the joint.
Matters that need your attention
- Do not turn on the led light strip by the electric power without removing the whole led light belt from the package or piling it into a mass.
- The general voltage of LED strip light is dc 12V, so it is necessary to use the switching power supply. The power supply is determined according to the power of LED strip light and the connection length. If you do not want to control every LED strip light with a power source, you can buy a high power switching power supply as the total power supply. Then, all LED lights are connected in parallel with the input power (if the wire size is not enough, it can be extended), and the power is provided by the general switching power supply.
- Some LED strip lights that can change color need to use the controller to realize the variable effect. The control distance of each controller is different. The control distance of a simple controller is 10 to 15 meters, the control distance of the remote controller is 15 to 20 meters, and the maximum control distance can be 30 meters.
- Generally speaking, the 3528 series LED light belt has a maximum connection distance of 20 meters, and the 5050 series LED light belt has a maximum connection distance of 15 meters. If the connection distance is exceeded, the LED lamp belt is easy to heat up, and the service life of the LED lamp belt will be affected.
- When led lights are connected in tandem with each other, try to light them up once for each connection. This can timely find out whether the positive and negative terminals are connected incorrectly and whether the direction of the light emitted from each light belt is consistent.
Hope this article can help you when you have trouble installing the LED strip lights.