External power supply hot to touch on connector?

Troubleshooting
1

Hi all,

Thanks for the help in my previous post. I have just about every kink fixed with these. Since each light was 144 LEDs long, I ended up buying external 50 w power supplies for each.

I am using these power supplies from Amazon, that are supposed to go with my LEDs. However, I noticed they get pretty darn hot, even after just being connected for a couple of minutes.

Specifically, the spot im talking about is the plastic piece you connect the white/red wires into the screw terminals to the female end.

I’m really nervous about leaving these in my ceilings for all day lighting. Has anyone else had this experience?

2

You mean the power at the barrel connectors? Those are notoriously bad for exactly your problem: can’t run much power thru them.

Based on the photo at Amazon, that’s it. You would be better off cutting the barrel off and wiring directly

See Power Supplies - Digital LEDs - quinled.info

Tip: The barrel connector most power supplies ship with is only rated for max 5A to 10A. The barrel to 2 pin converter blocks are often only rated for 3Amps to 5Amps! Please snip off the end and use the bare wires (with wire ferrules).

2 Likes
3

I haven’t had any problem with those. If it’s hot, that is definitely not good. Only 144 LEDs? That is surprising, but the heat indicates a poor connection. Are you running them at 100% for illumination?

1 Like
4

Yes. I’ve tried with other similar power supplies as well, everytime the barrel connector gets really hot in ~2 minutes.

I am half tempted to just run these suckers off of USB, although the 2.0 amp outputs leaves me short on wattage.

5

Wow. I should have read reviews before buying those. I think I need 8 amps if my math was correct, so its back the drawing board. Thanks!

6

I’m running 4 strings of 144 SK9822 on a 12/24 volt at 5v/15amp converter. I ran it last night for a few hours without issue.

BINZET DC Converter Step Down Regulator 5V Regulated Power Supplies Transformer Converter (5V 15A 75W)

I guess I can’t upload a short video file.

7

Awesome. Do you think they’d be fine with ~16 hours a day of use?

8

I don’t see why not. If it was going to fail it should have happened in the hours I was using it.

9

The problem isn’t your power supply, it’s your wiring aka the barrel connectors. Remove them, and wire it with just good gauge wire and you’ll be ok. IANAE. (I am not an electrician.)

You essentially have a bottleneck in the flow with those barrel connectors. That’s why they get hot.

1 Like
10

FWIW i like the anderson ‘powerpole’ connectors for power distribution of more than a few amps.

2 Likes
11

So I just got back from Burningman and I ran the Pyramid every night from 7pm until 8am for 8 nights and it was flawless. I received a lot of accolades regarding this very simple camp marker. It never got hot or had any hiccups.

2 Likes