LYC Home report: Successfully replaced under counter LEDs (again). Long explanation inside
Posted by
oblique (aka kkuphal)
Apr 24 '23, 09:02
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Originally I had two Govee strips. They worked well but one died and I was refunded by Govee (nice). I wanted local (non-cloud) integration with Home Assistant so I bought some zigbee strips but they were significantly dimmer than the Govee ones and it bothered me (and my wife even mentioned it so yeah)
Thus began the LED strip crusade of early 2023. My first inclination was to buy matching strips and extend them because I had to clip both strips when installing them so I knew I had some length left. These were USB strips and 5V so it wasn't exactly easy but I found a set on ebay and bought them. Now, I don't exactly remember why but something was wrong between the set I bought and the ones installed to where I decided to start over with the project. I'll have to look back and see specifically what the issue was.
Here I learned WAY more than I thought I needed about LED strips but ultimately I was VERY VERY pleased with the results
First, LED strips advertise "LED/m" as a way to indicate how many LEDs there are. What is shitty is that many list individual LEDs on strips where they have a WW, CW, and RBG LED (warm white, cool white, RGB) to where if they say there are 72/m, it is actually 24 because there is one of each LED in a group of 3. I was able to find an LED strip that has a combined LED that does all three in one so that the 60 LED/m is actually 60, not 1/3 of that. (https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B08R3G56WL/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o05_s01?ie=UTF8&psc=1)
Second, I bought a new zigbee LED controller as these strips were 12V instead of the 5V I had. Also got a 12V power supply with enough juice to power the entire strip because my plan was to extend it over our range hood. The power supply is GINORMOUS so I may have over shot but whatever, it works.
The end result is fantastic. I used the LED extenders to create an actual corner. Drilled through our cabinet trim to run the wire through the wood instead of looping it over like I was doing before. Extended the wire over our range hood with the wires inside our cabinets. The strip I got is super bright. All told took me a good 4 hours or so to get it all done. Bought a bunch more LED parts that I thought I needed but didn't so I have some for the next project
Now I just need to figure out what to do with the 5V strips I have :)
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