5050 60 leds per metre RGB

what strip should i buy and why

There is a plethora of choices available, does not make selection easy.

Top 3 Tips

Led Pitch; Dictates led strip voltage in terms of cut length but also the closer the led pitch the smoother the light will appear. Note when mounting in profiles with diffusers, the smoothness of the light is a combination of both led pitch and the distance from the diffuser, deeper is better but you will sacrifice some output and beam angles

Voltage: The higher the voltage the lower the drive current required and may influence the variety of driver choices available

Colour Consistency; Always look for single bin led strip preferably in 3 Step Macadams, this will ensure over a long linear run the colour is consistent down the line

how do i power or drive my strips

Most led ribbon contains leds and resistors, these resistors work as current limiting devices and as such require a constant voltage led driver to function. The benefit of this is that relatively long strings of ribbon can be powered as leds on ribbon have small groups of led series strings and all those are in parallel. This makes wiring up long runs easier to do in terms of driver selection. Here’s the rub, you need to consider capacity.

• DRIVER CAPACITY. THE COMBINED WATTAGE OF YOUR LED RIBBON STRING CANNOT EXCEED THE WATTAGE OF THE DRIVER

• STRIP CAPACITY. THE ELECTRICAL CONSTRAINTS OF THE RIBBON MEAN YOU CANNOT RUN A SINGLE LENGTH OF RIBBON WITHOUT CONSIDERATION OF VOLT AND POWER LOSS OVER DISTANCE.

So in combination of both these issues at some point you will need to add addtional led drivers into the design, typically if you exceed 10 metres