[email protected] 23 Posted December 3, 2014 Report Share Posted December 3, 2014 I have had a successful 4 days with no problems.....last night some of my lights (LEDs) started to not go 100% off. This was mid sequence (and after the show ended), such as after a blink or fade they would go dark and then look like they were running about 10% on. The weird part is that in a string of say 3 strands, only the first and last strand were partially light. I have seen some people talk about adding a snubber (glade plugin?) to solve this issue. I don't understand why it would randomly start to occur after 4 nights. The other occurrence is that it rained last night (first time with the show on), not sure if moisture could be causing this issue? I shut everything down after the show last night and will put it all back on after work today. If it happens again, any ideas? Where/ how/what do I use as a snubber? Link to post Share on other sites
[email protected] 23 Posted December 3, 2014 Author Report Share Posted December 3, 2014 I did more digging and found this thread has anyone/does anyone still use these? I may attempt to make some. Would also love to hear if people really do use glad plugins Link to post Share on other sites
Roger 15 Posted December 3, 2014 Report Share Posted December 3, 2014 Using terminators does help but more with fading and fast effects. One of the main problems I have found is the power source to the controller box, some people have removed the grounding prong on the box causing them to power their box wrong. LOR's are built to switch current and power not NUTRAL, feeding current or voltage on neutral will cause "after glow" and damage to LED's plus cause bad fading. The reason some of the LED sets might not after glow is they are receiving the right power. Check to insure your LOR units are powered right. You can use a volt meter or one of the voltage testers and make sure voltage is coming into the box on the BLACK wire NOT the WHITE. Link to post Share on other sites
Don Johnson 10 Posted December 3, 2014 Report Share Posted December 3, 2014 Try putting the LED's on a different channel to see if the problem continues. If it does not, you may have a bad triac (although I am not sure why it would only effect the 1st and third string if that was the problem. If the problem still persists, try adding an incandescent bulb at the beginning or the end of the strings. You can black it out if needed. Sometimes the LED's use so little power, it is difficult for the LOR unit to regulate it. Search the forum for information on bad triacs if that is the problem LOR is pretty good about sending you some triacs if you are good at soldering. If not, you can send it to them and they will replace it for you. Link to post Share on other sites
TED 137 Posted December 3, 2014 Report Share Posted December 3, 2014 last night some of my lights (LEDs) started to not go 100% off. The other occurrence is that it rained last night (first time with the show on), not sure if moisture could be causing this issue? I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that it was the rain. I had the same thing happen. I have about 5-6 strands of LEDs that I used to make a Halloween tree. After it rained I noticed that the lights were just barely on even though the receptacle that they were plugged in to was turned off. (I verified the lights were slightly on by unplugging the lights which caused them to go out.) The rain dried up and it never happened again. I don't quite understand how it happened but I have a suspicion that the receptacle in question is wired up wrong and is switched on the neutral side instead of the positive side. I don't know if that has anything to do with it or not. TED Link to post Share on other sites
TED 137 Posted December 3, 2014 Report Share Posted December 3, 2014 Using terminators does help but more with fading and fast effects. One of the main problems I have found is the power source to the controller box, some people have removed the grounding prong on the box causing them to power their box wrong. LOR's are built to switch current and power not NUTRAL, feeding current or voltage on neutral will cause "after glow" and damage to LED's plus cause bad fading. The reason some of the LED sets might not after glow is they are receiving the right power. Check to insure your LOR units are powered right. You can use a volt meter or one of the voltage testers and make sure voltage is coming into the box on the BLACK wire NOT the WHITE. My first thought is that it shouldn't matter since it's alternating current, but as I said in my post above I suspect the outlet where I had this happen is switched on the neutral side instead of the positive side. Maybe the wet conditions from the rain allowed a "neutral" connection between the lights and the ground. (Obviously this is just speculation but I can't think of a better explanation.) TED Link to post Share on other sites
[email protected] 23 Posted December 3, 2014 Author Report Share Posted December 3, 2014 My instant thought was that the rain/ moisture is goofing something up. I think if it was a different issue I would have seen it from the very start, not 4 days into the show! Either way, everything has been unplugged since 11pm last night (east coast). When I get home from work today I will plug it all back in and see what happens.....unfortunately it has been raining all day again! Hopefully tomorrow everything will dry out and I can test for sure..... The show ran just fine, it just looked a little off with certain strands on at about 5-10%. They did go fully off after each flash or fade, but then jumped back to 5%/10%. Very strange..... Link to post Share on other sites
castlechristmas 6 Posted December 4, 2014 Report Share Posted December 4, 2014 What gen controller are you using? Have you set the dimming curves? Link to post Share on other sites
dlaird 0 Posted December 4, 2014 Report Share Posted December 4, 2014 I have corrected a number of channels with this issue over the years by replacing the TRIAC. Link to post Share on other sites
[email protected] 23 Posted December 4, 2014 Author Report Share Posted December 4, 2014 I just bought the controller this july (not sure what gen that is). I do not know anything about dimming curves? I dont think it is the triacs because it comes and goes, last night certain channels went back to normal and others experienced the issue..... this morning it looked like MOST of the lights were 100% off, but cant really tell with the higher gutters in the daylight Link to post Share on other sites
castlechristmas 6 Posted December 5, 2014 Report Share Posted December 5, 2014 If it is new it is a gen three. There should be a yellow paper manual that will have instructions. It is in the hardware utility under advanced configuration. You should set the dimming curve for any channel using LEDs, it helps quite a bit. Link to post Share on other sites
castlechristmas 6 Posted December 5, 2014 Report Share Posted December 5, 2014 If need be send me a pm and I can give you my phone number to walk you through the process. Link to post Share on other sites
[email protected] 23 Posted December 5, 2014 Author Report Share Posted December 5, 2014 Thanks Castle.....I think I found how to do it in the online manual.....I will adjust the curves tonight to see if it helps. Its very strange because they are much better than they were, seems like its mostly the blues that are staying on. If I have any problems after I adjust the curves I will be back lol. Link to post Share on other sites
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.