LED install question

[blackcup]

Hey guys ... I am just about to tackle my LED install and I was wondering a few things. I am a total newbie to this so I just had a question.

I have 2 x 6' RGB strips and 14 LED cupholders. I also have a boat plug LED light from Diablo Royale. Here is the link:

http://boatpluglight.com/products/y-knot-triple-typhon-3000-lumens

1 - can I just wire all of these up to the existing courtesy light switch on the boat now? Or will all of these be too much of a power draw on them?

2 - I only want the blue from the RGB strips ... can I just eliminate the need for a controller?

I was going to have an installer do this for me but now I feel like just tackling it myself.

Thanks!

[mmandley]

Yes you can wire them all into the courtesy light switch, LEDS are very low power draw.

[icemanftr]

http://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20160521/9731fe57425d931720e012a7b7973284.jpg

That's what I did.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[mcdye]

what size wire do you use from the led strip to the power? I have plenty of Cat 5 wire. :)

[icemanftr]

what size wire do you use from the led strip to the power? I have plenty of Cat 5 wire. :)

I used 16g I had laying around.

[blackcup]

I think I am going to put all the interior LEDs on their own ACC switch ... maybe keep the courtesy lights separate from the LEDs in case I just want one or the other?

I will probably wire the drain plug light into the NAV light so that whenever the boat is being driven at night the underwater LED will be on.

What does everyone else do?

[russellsmojo]

Hey guys ... I am just about to tackle my LED install and I was wondering a few things. I am a total newbie to this so I just had a question.

I have 2 x 6' RGB strips and 14 LED cupholders. I also have a boat plug LED light from Diablo Royale. Here is the link:

http://boatpluglight.com/products/y-knot-triple-typhon-3000-lumens

1 - can I just wire all of these up to the existing courtesy light switch on the boat now? Or will all of these be too much of a power draw on them?

2 - I only want the blue from the RGB strips ... can I just eliminate the need for a controller?

I was going to have an installer do this for me but now I feel like just tackling it myself.

Thanks!

Have you fitted the plug light? I bought the triple one in all brass. It would work with wakeplate. I am going to swap it out and would like to know if yours works.

[blackcup]

Not yet nope ... pretty eager to get it on there and see what it looks like. Sounds like we have the same one

[russellsmojo]

Not yet nope ... pretty eager to get it on there and see what it looks like. Sounds like we have the same one

Heck. I cannot type. I may have drank too much lake water today or cold beer. Ha My boat plug light would not fit. The wake plate was all in the way. Hoping yours fits so I can swap for one like yours. I have this one.
http://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20160522/e00270877ca06768200b32b2822edb26.jpg

[trayson]

Heck. I cannot type. I may have drank too much lake water today or cold beer. Ha My boat plug light would not fit. The wake plate was all in the way. Hoping yours fits so I can swap for one like yours. I have this one.
http://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20160522/e00270877ca06768200b32b2822edb26.jpg

I'm pretty sure that I've heard of people making an adapter that moves those LED light plugs up so they don't interfere with the wakeplate. I'd imagine that you'd need a couple 90 degree elbows. if the elbows are Female/Female, than you'd need a couple of pipe nipples too.

[trayson]

I replaced my court lights (they were all but worthless) with some surface mounted LED trailer marker lights (in blue). I have all my LED's tied into the Court Light circuit. (speaker rings, speaker angel eyes, cupholder lights, surface LED accent lights).

I will probably put in a separate switch when I finally get around to doing the underwater transom lights. while I've never had any trouble with on the water law enforcement for my underwater lights, I'd hate to get in a situation where I was on the water at night and the cop told me to turn off my transom lights and I couldn't because they were tied into the nav light circuit. It wouldn't be hard to wire in an inline switch and still tap it off that circuit though.

I likewise used some 16 gauge speaker wire I had laying around. I'd imagine for a few LED's here or there, the cat5 could work. But even though LED's are low draw, when you start stacking more and more, it does get to be some wattage going through your wire. I know that I have a 5m strip of SMD5050's for behind my TV at my house and the LED's generate heat you can feel (enough to soften the hot glue I tried to use to affix them with). so typically if I can feel heat, it means they're drawing at least a few watts. You really need to figure out the length of your runs and try to figure the wattage draw of all your LED's and the gauge of the cat5 to know for sure. there's lots of charts out there that show what gauge wire is needed for a given wattage for a certain length of wire run.

As a point of reference, I looked up a 5 meter SMD5050 strip light and found that it uses 72 watts. That's 1.2 amps per meter or 6 amps total for a 5 meter strip.

As far as if you're able to wire up your RGB's without a controller, it seems the answer is maybe. It might be as basic as only connecting the wire for blue and ground. But per this link, some of them are more complicated. http://diy.stackexchange.com/questions/51008/is-it-possible-to-only-use-one-color-of-an-rgb-led-strip

[blackcup]

Heck. I cannot type. I may have drank too much lake water today or cold beer. Ha My boat plug light would not fit. The wake plate was all in the way. Hoping yours fits so I can swap for one like yours. I have this one.
http://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20160522/e00270877ca06768200b32b2822edb26.jpg

Is this the same one that I posted in my link above? i don't have the light here in front of me to compare. The guys at Diablo said it will work with the '14 Mojo. I am thinking I might have to drop the wake plate to get it on?

[mmandley]

I would not wire any extra lights to your Nav switch.

This should be kept for only legal lights.

If your stopped at night by patrol they can tow you off the water because you have illegal lights that you can't turn off.

[blackcup]

I replaced my court lights (they were all but worthless) with some surface mounted LED trailer marker lights (in blue). I have all my LED's tied into the Court Light circuit. (speaker rings, speaker angel eyes, cupholder lights, surface LED accent lights).

I will probably put in a separate switch when I finally get around to doing the underwater transom lights. while I've never had any trouble with on the water law enforcement for my underwater lights, I'd hate to get in a situation where I was on the water at night and the cop told me to turn off my transom lights and I couldn't because they were tied into the nav light circuit. It wouldn't be hard to wire in an inline switch and still tap it off that circuit though.

I likewise used some 16 gauge speaker wire I had laying around. I'd imagine for a few LED's here or there, the cat5 could work. But even though LED's are low draw, when you start stacking more and more, it does get to be some wattage going through your wire. I know that I have a 5m strip of SMD5050's for behind my TV at my house and the LED's generate heat you can feel (enough to soften the hot glue I tried to use to affix them with). so typically if I can feel heat, it means they're drawing at least a few watts. You really need to figure out the length of your runs and try to figure the wattage draw of all your LED's and the gauge of the cat5 to know for sure. there's lots of charts out there that show what gauge wire is needed for a given wattage for a certain length of wire run.

As a point of reference, I looked up a 5 meter SMD5050 strip light and found that it uses 72 watts. That's 1.2 amps per meter or 6 amps total for a 5 meter strip.

As far as if you're able to wire up your RGB's without a controller, it seems the answer is maybe. It might be as basic as only connecting the wire for blue and ground. But per this link, some of them are more complicated. http://diy.stackexchange.com/questions/51008/is-it-possible-to-only-use-one-color-of-an-rgb-led-strip

Thats actually a really good point. I think I want the underwater light on a separate switch. Cops here aren't hardcore at all but would never want to be in that situation where you can't comply with what they ask.

Thanks for the RGB link I'll give it a read and see what I come up with

[Alerberg]

Quick Question for you guys... I bought cup holder led rings from Blast LED the other day (8 of them, single color red) and will start wiring them soon. Do I start at the farthest point away from the switch and start making my way back to it? Do I connect one to the next and so on? How do I tie into the wiring at the accessories switch under the dash?

Thank you in advance!

[Alerberg]

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[dusty2221]

Those look great

[deerfield]

Alerberg - Nicely done! What did you decide with respect to wiring? - Deerfield

[996scott]

those look great. nice job

[Alerberg]

Thanks for the compliments... For the wiring, it was kind of interesting. At first I thought I would tie everything back to the court lights switch but soon realized that Moomba has pre-wired our boats with lots of extra wiring that terminates with blue crimp on terminals in various places throughout the boat. So, if you look under your gunnels you will see lots of split loom and at various points you will see wire that just terminates mid-run. In my case, one of those was on the passenger side of the boat really close to where my cupholders are located. I simply plugged in my new led light rings into the wires and turned on the various switches on the dash to see what worked. To my surprise, the court lights switch activated the led light ring. So for the passenger side I used crimp-ons to tie in all the lights. Since I still wanted to have working front and driver side led cupholder lights and didn't want to run a line all the way back around the bow of the boat, I decided to tie in the other LED rings on the driver side to the existing courtesy light on that side. I just peeled back the carpet, found the wires, and used weather-proof wire nuts (the one's with the goo on the inside). For the front, I first removed all the cushions, and ran a line all the way back to the courtesy lights and tied them in using the pre-mentioned wire nuts. I made sure to run split loom and zip tie it all to the existing split loom run throughout the boat so it all looks factory. My advice is find the various wiring end points (you will see them under your dash and in your gunnels) and tie into those. Moomba did a great job of pre-wiring for lots of add-on's so you should have the wiring all ready to go. I found wiring already installed by the factory for tower lights, tower speakers, front speakers, amplifiers, and courtesy lights. I even found some wires on the driver side that just terminated back by the motor and have no idea why they are there. They just end like the others with a blue crimp on terminal. Kind of cool!

[deerfield]

Moomba did a great job of pre-wiring for lots of add-on's so you should have the wiring all ready to go. I found wiring already installed by the factory for tower lights, tower speakers, front speakers, amplifiers, and courtesy lights. I even found some wires on the driver side that just terminated back by the motor and have no idea why they are there.

Contact Skiers Choice and request a comprehensive copy of the wiring blueprint or schematic. Would be helpful, handy reference for future modifications.