Led strip lights

[mrklean]

How many of you have put LED strip lights in your house how did you rig them up pictures of finished product?  

[nxtgeneration]

Are you talking portable or permanent house? 

[Billy G]

My dad bought a small roll of led strips online for like under 10 bucks and you you cut them to length of strip you want and then It kinda presses down on the wire to make the connection. He just runs one strip in the middle pole on top in his otter portable and it lights up way better than the built in clam ones you can buy. He just runs alligator clips to his vexlair instead of a battery for how little energy they use.

[nxtgeneration]

I bought a couple 24" stick on ones.  One on a roof pole and one in the sled.  Bought a clam battery bracket to hold a vex battery.  I built a switch box that has a switch for each light, a fan the hangs from a roof pole, and a 12v/usb plug in.  put my fuses in the box and connected to alligator clips to hook up to the battery.  i also put a digital battery indicator in the switch box so i can monitor my battery level.

[YettiStyle]

I don't know if you're talking portable or permanent shack but I installed some strip lighting in my Yetti to be used as the hole lighting.  The link below is the stuff I bought off of Amazon ($12) and it is really good. It is weatherproof, low power consumption, and really easy to work with.  You can cut it to any length you want.  The adhesive that is on the back is pretty weak so I just used a small bead of extra silicone adhesive and it isn't going anywhere.  Each side is independently controlled by their own switches on the side of the wheel well for easy access at night when the rattle wheels are going off. 

I actually hid the strip itself by essentially cutting a notch out of the 1x2 trim board it is installed in.  You cant see the strip itself unless you are basically right underneath them and look straight up.  I just used the table saw to cut out about a 3/8" deep by 1/4" wide corner of the trim.  I can take a picture later if you want an example.  I've already gotten many comments on how fancy/professional they look and it was only a 30 minute project. 

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B006079BCK?psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_search_detailpage

Here is a picture of the installed lights.  Only the 2 strip lights are on in this picture so they do put off a fair amount of light.  Each side is only about 6ft long. 

Edited February 23, 2016 by YettiStyle

[Moon Lake Refuge]

33 minutes ago, YettiStyle said:

I don't know if you're talking portable or permanent shack but I installed some strip lighting in my Yetti to be used as the hole lighting.  The link below is the stuff I bought off of Amazon ($12) and it is really good. It is weatherproof, low power consumption, and really easy to work with.  You can cut it to any length you want.  The adhesive that is on the back is pretty weak so I just used a small bead of extra silicone adhesive and it isn't going anywhere.  Each side is independently controlled by their own switches on the side of the wheel well for easy access at night when the rattle wheels are going off. 

I actually hid the strip itself by essentially cutting a notch out of the 1x2 trim board it is installed in.  You cant see the strip itself unless you are basically right underneath them and look straight up.  I just used the table saw to cut out about a 3/8" deep by 1/4" wide corner of the trim.  I can take a picture later if you want an example.  I've already gotten many comments on how fancy/professional they look and it was only a 30 minute project. 

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B006079BCK?psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_search_detailpage

Here is a picture of the installed lights.  Only the 2 strip lights are on in this picture so they do put off a fair amount of light.  Each side is only about 6ft long. 

How easy is this to replace if needed?  I like the look of it but I'm trying to make all of our lighting and recepticles easy to replace if needed.  Could you just leave an extra 6 inches of wire coiled in the wall that is able to be pulled out and re-spliced if needed?

 

[Lip_Ripper Guy]

1 hour ago, YettiStyle said:

I don't know if you're talking portable or permanent shack but I installed some strip lighting in my Yetti to be used as the hole lighting.  The link below is the stuff I bought off of Amazon ($12) and it is really good. It is weatherproof, low power consumption, and really easy to work with.  You can cut it to any length you want.  The adhesive that is on the back is pretty weak so I just used a small bead of extra silicone adhesive and it isn't going anywhere.  Each side is independently controlled by their own switches on the side of the wheel well for easy access at night when the rattle wheels are going off. 

I actually hid the strip itself by essentially cutting a notch out of the 1x2 trim board it is installed in.  You cant see the strip itself unless you are basically right underneath them and look straight up.  I just used the table saw to cut out about a 3/8" deep by 1/4" wide corner of the trim.  I can take a picture later if you want an example.  I've already gotten many comments on how fancy/professional they look and it was only a 30 minute project. 

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B006079BCK?psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_search_detailpage

Here is a picture of the installed lights.  Only the 2 strip lights are on in this picture so they do put off a fair amount of light.  Each side is only about 6ft long. 

Great idea!  

[Moon Lake Refuge]

8 minutes ago, Lip_Ripper Guy said:

Great idea!  

Going on the next build??

[Lip_Ripper Guy]

6 minutes ago, Moon Lake Refuge said:

Going on the next build??

Absolutely!  Already ordered 2 rolls!

Mine will be red for night fishing, and mounted slightly differently along the ceiling trim boards.  

[Moon Lake Refuge]

1 minute ago, Lip_Ripper Guy said:

Absolutely!  Already ordered 2 rolls!

Mine will be red for night fishing, and mounted slightly differently along the ceiling trim boards.  

I just ordered some 1 footers and a dimmer to spice up my flasher ha!  Going to convince the old man to look into these for the house too.  I might even see if I can find a way to incorporate them as reading lights for the bunks.  Definitely going in the benches and some of the cabinets for accent lights though.

[dj2quick35]

42 minutes ago, Lip_Ripper Guy said:

Absolutely!  Already ordered 2 rolls!

Mine will be red for night fishing, and mounted slightly differently along the ceiling trim boards.  

how much better is it fishing with the red lights compared to standard? 

[Lip_Ripper Guy]

47 minutes ago, dj2quick35 said:

how much better is it fishing with the red lights compared to standard? 

Quite a bit.  The key is making the red lights somewhat indirect, as looking right at them will still blind you.  Shining down from the wheel well like YettiStyle's is perfect.  I have a small tube that goes under my back table to shine forward, and then I'm going to mount the strip lights recessed into my ceiling trim.  I may do a couple 2 or 3 LED clearance lights under a cabinet, range hood, speaker box, etc.      

[rustysetter]

I don't have pictures yet but I mounted mine along the edge underneath the the lip of the counter top that runs from v all the way back to the door, the led strip lights are a nice option in a wheelhouse or portable, but the remote controlled option in a wheelhouse is pretty cool. 

[Moon Lake Refuge]

Is anyone running them in the ceiling in place of the traditional camper lights or flush mount lights?  I like the idea of being able to just strip these down to whatever length I want, I'm just hesitant to either not have light in the center of the ceiling or have a strip down the center that is unprotected and blinding.

Edit, almost thinking of shimming out some crown molding all along the ceiling with 3/4 inch strips and running white up top and red out the bottom or vice versa.  Think it would put out the light needed?  Would likely just screw it on for ease of removing if I ever had to replace any lights.

Edited February 24, 2016 by Moon Lake Refuge

[YettiStyle]

Whatever you do, make sure you get WARM white if you are getting white, it looks more natural.  And if you get multiple strips make sure you connect them to a 12v battery before you install them to verify the entire length works and they are the same color.  I used 2 different strips and both were white but one was cool white and the other was warm white.  As far as red vs white vs ultraviolet (yes they do make these in UV), I've always heard that red is better than white and UV is the best of them all for fishing.  With that being said, we actually caught many more fish this year in my shack with these lights on than we did with them off fishing in anywhere between 12 FOW to 23 FOW with decent water clarity.  I'm sure there are days where it makes a difference but so far I have had no reason to turn shack into a picture developing darkroom with red LEDs.

 

As far as using these as normal ceiling lights or in different areas - the elements in these strips are very bright.  The reasons I tucked the strip up into the molding was to make it look a little bit professionally finished but mainly to diffuse the direct brightness that is a natural to any SMD LED (surface mount device - sorry, I'm an electrical engineer ha).  If you mount these in the ceiling or any other place, keep in mind that looking directly at these will be irritating.  Tucking it in a little area such as inside a grove cut into some trim basically diffuses the inherent "spot light" nature of SMD LED's and creates a flood light effect that is much more pleasant and easier on the eyes.  That being said, I wouldn't really recommend running a strip of this down the middle of your shack instead of using a couple standard LED RV lights.  It would definitely be bright enough but would also be irritating at the same time. 

 

Here is how a better picture of how I mounted the strips into the trim under my counter. 

[Moon Lake Refuge]

Ouch... Just did a little more research and correct me if I'm wrong but I'm showing a 16 footer runs 2 amps so one down each side would run 4 amps.  Thats a pretty high draw.  May look into adding a two inch molding strip down the middle and recessing it down a half inch with spacers and run the light over the top of it.  This would prevent looking directly at it... would also be putting a dimmer on it.  Going to look into it a bit more but this may be ideal for smaller runs for someone who isn't looking at running a generator as often.

Do you think 8 one foot strips along the center of the ceiling with a diffuser between you and the light would provide sufficient light for the house?  That would drop to 1 amp

Edited February 24, 2016 by Moon Lake Refuge

[YettiStyle]

They do have quite a bit of amp draw but they are pretty potent little guys.  Even though you are considering a dimmer switch you still wouldn't have the same amount of control that you would get with regular RV LED's

These are the LED lights I installed for my ceiling.  Very uniform, bright, and less power consumption but a little more $$ up front.  I used 3 of these in my 8x16 and they are perfect (I used a cheap one off amazon to light the closet in the V-Nose).  That totaled up to about 1.5 amps on full (440mA each).  These are dimmable as well though so I have a master dimmable switch to control all of these. 

The nice part about using the RV lights instead of the light strips as your main source of light is the controllability.  Each RV light has its own individual switch.  So if the back half of the shack wants to play cards on the table and the front half wants to watch TV and sleep I can just turn on the back light and turn off the other two lights.  Unless you do multiple segments of the strip, you are going to be limited to an all or nothing kind of situation - even with a dimmer switch.  Having multiple lights just gives you more flexibility. 

Here is a link to the lights: (great page for all your LED needs)

https://www.superbrightleds.com/moreinfo/led-dome-light-fixtures-non-waterproof/105-oval-dome-light-led-fixture-with-switch/1490/3465/

Here is a link to the dimmer switch I used as the master switch to basically control the power (on/off/vary voltage) to all of the lights.  Having the individual switches on each light doesn't affect this.  I love this switch - you will get many compliments on it.  Haven't had a problem with the touch feature not working with the cold yet.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00S667XZA?psc=1&redirect=true&ref_=oh_aui_search_detailpage

[Moon Lake Refuge]

Good info.  The amp draw of those three lights looks to equal the draw of 11 feet of the strip light.  At a combined 810 lumens for those three lights the strip lights would put off around 850 at the same amp draw for 11 feet so if I space them out and dont lose to much light due to having them be indirect off of a piece of molding it may actually not be a bad Idea.  Sorry to take up so much of your time ha just trying to get everything figured out to wire this spring.  Got a baby coming in a couple weeks then its back to the house after that! 

In case anyone else is counting amp draw I came up with the below for the strip lights.

watts	feet	watts per ft	amps	Lumens
1.5	1	1.5	0.125	82
1.5	2	3	0.25	164
1.5	3	4.5	0.375	246
1.5	4	6	0.5	328
1.5	5	7.5	0.625	410
1.5	6	9	0.75	492
1.5	7	10.5	0.875	574
1.5	8	12	1	656
1.5	9	13.5	1.125	738
1.5	10	15	1.25	820
1.5	11	16.5	1.375	902
1.5	12	18	1.5	984
1.5	13	19.5	1.625	1066
1.5	14	21	1.75	1148
1.5	15	22.5	1.875	1230
1.5	16	24	2	1312

[Princeton]

I used them in two areas in my house, one was under the cabinets over the counter top in the front of the house.  The other was I ran them on the top of the house and aimed them up so they reflected up off the curved ceiling, I have a 12 foot string on one side and a 8 footer on the opposite side of the house.  It puts off a good amount of indirect light but agree they take a lot of energy to run. 

 The first set of lights burned out after the first year of use.  When I replaced them I bought the encased ones that are water resistant.  I would test them before installing them.  To mount them I cut a slot just wide enough for the lights to sit in with my table saw.

Edited February 24, 2016 by Princeton

[bobbymalone]

3 hours ago, Princeton said:

 

 The first set of lights burned out after the first year of use.  

 

 

 

Cheap Chinese electronics.  Some vendors have better QC, but these things are all coming out of the same factory in China.

[Princeton]

On February 24, 2016 at 5:24 PM, bobbymalone said:

Cheap Chinese electronics.  Some vendors have better QC, but these things are all coming out of the same factory in China.

Yep, you get what you pay for.   I found some supposidly american made ones for $100 for a 15 foot spool on-line.   I am sure if you go with a more reputable source you can find higher quality.

[Moon Lake Refuge]

12 hours ago, Princeton said:

Yep, you get what you pay for.   I found some supposidly american made ones for $100 for a 15 foot spool on-line.   I am sure if you go with a more reputable source you can find higher quality.

Do a lot of research if you want truly American made.  A lot of times American made can also unfortunately mean American repackaged.

[teamlatenight]

I bought a roll of LEDs off the internet and contact cemented them to a closet rod sized dowel with a weight on one end then inserted that into a clear plastic hose capping both ends and have been using it for an underwater light for night fishing salmon OR we just hang it from the ceiling of our portable ice house for interior lighting no complaints...........

[bobbymalone]

3 hours ago, Moon Lake Refuge said:

Do a lot of research if you want truly American made.  A lot of times American made can also unfortunately mean American repackaged.

I would be very surprised if you found any american manufacturer of LED strip lights.