Installing LED strips with their own hands

Write highlight the interior and can arrange room lighting by using LED strip.Install LED Strip can be in the living room, and in any room and in the restaurant, café and even a garage.With the installation you can do yourself, so feel free to go to the store to buy everything you need.

Choosing LED strip

First you need to understand that this is a lighting fixture.It is unusual to many, large size lamp, which is quite simple to install and connect to the existing power grid.LED strip consists of small bulbs the same or different colors, arranged on a thin ribbon.Light-emitting diodes (the resistors and providing resistance) are located at a certain distance from each other.Standard tape width of 1 cm and a thickness of 3 mm.

Most often colloquially referred to as the miniature electrical lighting fixture as "Rope" or "Tape Rope."Because the wound tape on reel and ready for sale segments, 5 m long.

Huge selection of LED strip makes the customer think about what is best to buy the tape to deal with the connection yourself.

Consider the popular types of tape:

1. Protected against moisture.This ribbon with a lot of small bulbs can be installed in lighting areas where high humidity is present.For example, in the kitchen, in the bathroom, in unheated rooms.
2. On the basis of the sticky - do not need to exert much effort to perform the installation of LED tape in remote places or where it is impossible to drill holes for mounting.For example, such tape-based adhesive is suitable for installation in a cabinet or closet.
3. Single color and multi-colored.Standard color of light bulbs - white, but you can buy a tape with the red, blue, green and yellow lights.You can buy a one-color Rope coil or select a tape with colored lights, which are connected in series.This option is much more interesting, because with the help of a special unit - the controller, you can control the order of inclusion of each color.

Why should you opt for LED tape?This inconspicuous lighting fixture is often overlooked, because buyers do not know what are the advantages of this product.

Advantages of LED strip:

• little power, and hence economical use of electricity - it turns out that you can organize beautiful lighting in the room and at the same time to save your budget;
• long life makes it possible not to think about alternative sources of lighting.The unit served from 5 to 12 years;
• due to the fact that the light bulbs are arranged in a flexible manner, it is possible to give the tape a desired shape with soft contours and perform installation of LED strip in any, even the most remote place;
• the buyer has a great opportunity to save the family budget and buy only as much tape as necessary.Seller will cut the ribbon you desired length (Cutting the multiplicity of 6-10 cm, ie every 3 or 5 light bulbs);
• excellent efficiency.If you compare the work of LED strip with conventional incandescent lamps, it can be concluded that 70% of the heat given lighting unit goes to space heating, but not for lighting.A LED ribbon just does not emit heat, but power consumption is spent only on the organization of lighting;
• bulbs do not flicker, and therefore do not spoil the vision;
• not study the ultraviolet;
• withstand voltage drops in the network;
• operate at low pressure, as used when installing additional power supplies;
• opportunity to pick up any ribbon color and the color of light bulbs;
• meet environmental regulations and fire safety;
• over the years, the quality of bulbs glow does not change;
• carry out the installation of the tape can be yourself, especially if you use adhesive tape on the base.Or to be smart and do not drill holes in the wall and not to litter in a room where repairs have been made, it can be pasted on the back of the strong double sided tape and "plant" bulbs in the right place;
• manufacturer gives guarantee on the goods, which can not be said of other lighting fixtures (incandescent and fluorescent).

Deficiencies in the tape of 2: brightness is insufficient when compared to the glow of LED lamps with conventional lamps and low color rendering.That is, the items included with the tape will not be as bright as sunlight.Moreover, multi-colored tape often "goes" in one of the colors by installing white lights (glow blue, green or yellow tint).

Backlight LED flat ribbon.Photo:

Installation

LED strips with your hands Let's start with what we learn about the most important rule tape installation - can not be directly connected to a standard electrical bulb.Tape is not designed for high voltage and can burn.Such a light source can operate only on a minimum voltage of 12 or 23 W, and connect the tape only needs through a special device - the power supply.The device operates as follows: it lowers the voltage at the input (standard 220 V) to the required level and protects the LED light bulb from electrical surges.It is very important to get not only the LED strip, but also to choose the right power supply unit, paying attention to the power of the device.Calculation of power can be calculated independently, knowing the number of lights on the tape, plus a small margin of 20%.As a rule, in large shops lighting consultants offer customers to buy immediately ready for the installation of a set of LED strip with the unit.

If you buy your own belt, trying to save money, then you need to adhere to these rules:

1. Decide on the length of the tape.
2. Pick up power supply.
3. Mount the tape.
4. Connect the tape to the power supply and check your work.

When buying LED strip is necessary to pay attention to the quality of the contact and wires.As a rule, most of the products supplied to us from China, so the quality is poor, but the price is quite satisfied.Take a good look at the tape, if you see that the contacts in place of the input wires exposed, the wire can easily come off during operation or installation or even close.Next, pay attention to the length of the wires (green, red, blue, yellow).If they are short, it is also more difficult installation and will not guarantee long-term operation.From this tape it is better to give up, or if you bought a pig in a poke (the order through the online store), then you can try to rectify the situation.To do this with the help of a soldering iron, we need to remove the wiring short and buy colored wire.To avoid confusion in the correctness of the connection of light bulbs of different colors (the color of the wires this is the light bulb color), it is necessary to adhere to exactly the same scheme: long solder wire the desired color identical to the color of the LED crystals.

Buy a flexible stranded wire (diameter 0.75 mm).Since the end of the wire must be removed insulation material (0.5 mm), and on the other hand - 1 cm. Then you still need tips to close the exposed wire.

order not to get confused and buy the correct size tips, you need to pay attention to the packaging, marking and numbers indicate the section size.In this case 0.75 mm.

does not stop and continue to seek out (from a friend electrician) or purchase at the store a special tool to "put" on the wire tips.The price of such a tool is greater than the total cost of LED strip included, so if you are in the future will not use such a tool, it is better to take his hire.

Insert crimp very simple, enter the bare wire into the hole of the tip and then press the special tool.Do not try to make this part of the work or teeth with pliers.Nothing you do not succeed, you can not even try!

now need to solder wires to the tape.Here, too, it is important to become familiar with the nuances of the work: if you use a regular soldering iron, the heat can be spoiled by the neighboring LEDs, so you need to take a low-power soldering iron (25 W), as well as purchase the solder and rosin.Before you start soldering, wires need to tin (dipped in rosin).If you did everything correctly, you can admire the result of the work done:

for reliability soldering place wrapped with insulating tape.

If you have this preparatory work seemed too long and hard, you can buy LED strip complete and immediately proceed with the installation.

Installing LED strip on the ceiling

Most often, the luminaire is installed in the ceiling and is located in a special profile for LED strip.This aluminum profile with transparent diffuser made of plastic of various shapes.It uses the profile to highlight the organization not only ceilings and windows, shelves, kitchen cabinets and niches.

If you need to install the tape on the ceiling, it is given a special place for it - in the niche (eg plasterboard).It is necessary to prepare in advance a place, then to carry out installation of LED strip.

When connecting LED strip is necessary to determine where the "input" and where the "exit" and connect the wires correctly."Exit", this is the place to connect the tape.Plus you need to immediately identify the place where the power supply is located.

If you can not install a profile on the ceiling so as not to drill the wall, you can buy a tape with an adhesive layer and paste it directly into the niche, previously freed from the protective shell.Just kindly requested to prepare the surface - clean the place disinfecting means to get rid of dust and debris.

bend the tape is not recommended and allowable bend radius - up to 20 mm.If you want to cut the tape, it can be done the usual sharp scissors, and then connect the tape parallel to the power supply with the correct polarity.That is, the wire with the sign "+" is connected to the positive side, with the sign "-" to negative.So you do not confuse personal and not mess up the tape.

How to connect LED strips

Cut tape can be every 3 diodes, so that, depending on the density of the tape cutting can be every 5 or 10 cm. You can not go wrong, as each tape has a designation.If something is not done so, you can lose only 3 light bulbs, the rest of the piece of tape will work.Cut the LEDs can be ordinary scissors.

To connect two tape segment between them, it is necessary to observe the order.But then, at the junction of light quality can be reduced, the lamp will not shine as bright as neighbors.Therefore, the best option will be the connection of segments connected in parallel.To do this, you need to prepare a wire cross-section of 1 mm and stick to this scheme:

How to connect LED strips

principle of connecting tape is somewhat different.If you perform the installation of single-color ribbons, you can manage only the power supply and to install LED strips with colored lights (RGB), for additional installation of the controller.

How can I connect the tape:

• wires must be connected to the controller so that the wire color matches the color of the label on the device;
• established designation for red in the form of the letter «R», for the green «G» for the blue and «B»;
• to connect the black wire, select the instrument terminal labeled 12 or 24V;
• can now gather tape, check the correct assembly and connect to the network for verification.If it works, then you can start assembling the tape, but first need to disconnect the wiring from the controller.

After the tape will be installed in a fixed place, you need to reconnect wires to check the result of the work.If all goes well, this works on installation of LED strips with their hands completed.

Installing LED strip.Video: