DiyLightAnimation
Hardware => Lynx Smart String => Topic started by: JDM1oc on March 20, 2011,
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Does anyone know where I could get the rj45 pigtails like the ones used on the SS controllers? I could use them for a project at work. I know I could use keystone jacks, but I'm going for a bit more finished look.
Thanks,
Josh
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I would think after the coop completes, there should be a BOM in the wiki for it.
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Hate to bring a post back from the DEAD but also hate to start a new post for same thing - but ran across these today. Just a NOTE the wire scheme may (100% confident it is) be WAY different so verify it yourself. But wanted to post some helpful info along. But a good backup source if RJ runs out.
MonoPrice ItemID: 5088
http://www.monoprice.com/products/product.asp?c_id=102&cp_id=10208&cs_id=1020815&p_id=5088&seq=1&format=2
Harrison
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They are cross overs cables not stright and they are way too short. If a users uses these and wires them as in the manual it will burn up the stuff as the power would be crossed up so be careful with the stuff.
I have pleny of them I had to have 5000 of them made to be able to get them for us. they also cost us $1.25 so it is a lot cheaper for a longer pigtail that is wired correct.
RJ
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RJ - Tone doesn't carry well online (No Font for that) - so this isn't intended to be a dis in anyway.
They are cross overs cables not stright and they are way too short. If a users uses these and wires them as in the manual it will burn up the stuff as the power would be crossed up so be careful with the stuff.
I think I pointed this out - With DIY in the name implies you need to use your brian and some elbow grease is required.
I have pleny of them I had to have 5000 of them made to be able to get them for us. they also cost us $1.25 so it is a lot cheaper for a longer pigtail that is wired correct.
Never said they were cheaper and you have been known in the past to get a run on items so a backup source isn't a bad thing. Also back to the DIY thing maybe a short cables for someone in their application but want the same look. If we were going for cheaper a longer cable and a coupler would be cheaper (Under $1).
This was 100% hmmm nice to know and not a hit on your or anything (or even a gotcha - not sure how you interpreted it). I agree longer cable for cheaper and less thinking - no brainer to go with it. You can always cut a long cable but is tough to length a short one. I LOVE the way you go about and design things things an almost off the shelf DIY solution which is WELL thought out and EXTREMELY easy to assemble and use. It is tough to even begin to guess how many people I have recommended it to and will admit a huge fan boy of it.
Harrison
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Yes,
I do believe you read something in my post that i did not put there.
The post was to protect our users who most are not technical and thats why they are DLA. If they do not understand the difference and build 16 using these and damage items because i did not post then i have.failed. The length is an issue because you can not get to the ssc to program the firmware or set the program jumper easily. My concerns are always about users being successful so it is alway important to be sure the issues are pointed out clearly when options are provided.
The reason i know these facts are because i ordered and used them on the prototype. When they did not work as well as I would like I had ones made for us. By spending the money to do so i got them made cheap for us and this is one of the reasons the coop cost came down.
I assure you it was.not intend to be taken negatively by you.
Sent from my Charge by Tapatalk
RJ
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First off Happy Holidays everyone! I hope everyone had successful displays that brought joy to at least somebody! I know when I get tired of my display I see a child light up when they see it and it makes everything worth it!
Now for my question and why I am rambling on here!
2 years ago I purchased a Smart hub and some version 1 SSC's. I purchased some rectangle pixels from Ray Wu and started soldering and assembling for tests. My first tests were terrible and I was having a failure rate on pixels of over 50%.
I was getting frustrated so I put them down for a while.
Last year I purchased 6 SSC version 2 kits with pigtails and put them away due to busy schedule.
This season I pulled out all of my SSC's and build them and added the version 3 mods. When retested my pixels I only had a handful out of 100 fail. Yippee!!!!
When assembling my last few SSC's I noticed that the pigtails were solid core and not stranded wire and I seem to be having some issues with them. I then looked at the store to see if I could buy anymore and we are out.
Does anybody know where I can get some stranded wire pigtails, or should I go with the ones that I have that are solid core????
Has anyone had experience with the solid core pigtails and the SSC"s?
Curious and looking for guidance!
MIke.
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I have moved away from th45 pigtails to waterproof 4core connectors to avoid water issues.
Before that, I used crossover adaptors from monoprice. Externally they look the same, but they use different wire colors... Test the wires and adjust your soldering instructions, and you'll get identical results.
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Responding to questions in a PM... others may be interested...
On the SSC I use 3-core female to connect to the string... and 4-core male to connect to the cable that reaches to the smart hub. There is zero chance I will mix up the connectors because they won't match up. [/size]
The cable is cat5 in which I cut off the rj45 connector on one end. By using a cat5 cable, I still get the benefits of twisted pair to enable long distances. I still have one end of the cable using the rj45 connector to allow it to plug directly into the hub -- within a protected water-tight enclosure.
I had maybe half of my (50) rj45 connectors go bad my first year because I didn't take good water-protection precautions. This year, I had 0 problems with water -- despite a LOT more rain.
Another thing I did to ensure success... I had both cables (3core and 4core pigtails) entering a single cap on the PVC tube, the other end had no holes. With each tube/controller I used a large zip tie to orient the 2 holes in that one cap to face downward -- that way water would not enter the PVC tube. I tied the zip tie to a fence post -- or to the wire that reached upwards to my coroflakes. On my arches, I put a small stake into the ground and tied the PVC tube upright to the stake.
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This is a good idea and prevents you from connecting the wrong devices together. I still have a smart hub to build and will not be installing the RJ45's for the controller outputs. I will also be using the 4 pin waterproof connectors with the female side soldered directly to the board. I will also be looking to eliminate the cat5 here as well and am looking at various 16 gauge 4 conductor cables. I was trying to find some twisted pair cables and thought that I found some but now they seem to have dissapered. I will order a 100 feet or so of the best candidates and see how they perform signal wise under various condiions.
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This is a good idea and prevents you from connecting the wrong devices together. I still have a smart hub to build and will not be installing the RJ45's for the controller outputs. I will also be using the 4 pin waterproof connectors with the female side soldered directly to the board. I will also be looking to eliminate the cat5 here as well and am looking at various 16 gauge 4 conductor cables. I was trying to find some twisted pair cables and thought that I found some but now they seem to have dissapered. I will order a 100 feet or so of the best candidates and see how they perform signal wise under various condiions.
Will you be soldering to just 4 of the pads for each RJ-45 port or splitting the 4 to eight wires on the board to get to all 8 pads (where the RJ-45 port would have been)?
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I'm curious now, why the 4 core on the actual hub?
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I'm curious now, why the 4 core on the actual hub?
who is suggesting that? ...I suggest you use rj45 connectors on cat5 wire to connect to the hub... at the SSC, replace the rj45 connector with 4-core waterproof connectors. you need the twisted pair. and since the hub should be protected from the elements, it is fine to continue with rj45 connectors.
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This is a good idea and prevents you from connecting the wrong devices together. I still have a smart hub to build and will not be installing the RJ45's for the controller outputs. I will also be using the 4 pin waterproof connectors with the female side soldered directly to the board. I will also be looking to eliminate the cat5 here as well and am looking at various 16 gauge 4 conductor cables. I was trying to find some twisted pair cables and thought that I found some but now they seem to have dissapered. I will order a 100 feet or so of the best candidates and see how they perform signal wise under various condiions.
Will you be soldering to just 4 of the pads for each RJ-45 port or splitting the 4 to eight wires on the board to get to all 8 pads (where the RJ-45 port would have been)?
If you look at the board, you will see that the power and ground connections are grouped together on the same trace so you only need to tag one of each to get the same result so I will only be soldering to 4 pads.
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I'm curious now, why the 4 core on the actual hub?
who is suggesting that? .
tbone did, thats why I was curious. I get it on the ssc side but the hub side not 100% why, I have a few ideas but I'm just curious what they are thinking. Maybe easier mounting into a different type of case or hate taking the cat5 out if them need to.
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I'm curious now, why the 4 core on the actual hub?
The primary purpose of doing this it is to get away from cat5 cable being used between the hub and the controller. There seems to be WAAAAY to much voltage drop and the RJ45 connector was simply not designed for this type of use. My display will also be in a serious state of flux for the next few years which means that many things will be moving around as well as being added and changed. It simply is not practial for me to have to keep ordering custom cables only to move somthing and make the cable useless and require me to have to order another one. The contacts on the 4 core connectors are much more capable of handeling the current we are pushing thru them withou the corrosion issues seen with the RJ45's. Doing this also prevents me from accidently plugging the wrong item into one of the hubs controller outputs and damaging the device.
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I'm curious now, why the 4 core on the actual hub?
who is suggesting that? ...I suggest you use rj45 connectors on cat5 wire to connect to the hub... at the SSC, replace the rj45 connector with 4-core waterproof connectors. you need the twisted pair. and since the hub should be protected from the elements, it is fine to continue with rj45 connectors.
It was me and unless your hubs are inside the house, they are still subject to the outside weather conditions including high humidity and temp changes that can cause condensation in the connectors. At the speed that we send data, I'm not sure how much we really NEED the twisted pair, or at least not at the cat5 level. I will do plenty of testing, subjecting the wire types I am looking at to various types and levels of interference to see what works and what doesn't before I make any commitments.
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I'm curious now, why the 4 core on the actual hub?
who is suggesting that? ...I suggest you use rj45 connectors on cat5 wire to connect to the hub... at the SSC, replace the rj45 connector with 4-core waterproof connectors. you need the twisted pair. and since the hub should be protected from the elements, it is fine to continue with rj45 connectors.
It was me and unless your hubs are inside the house, they are still subject to the outside weather conditions including high humidity and temp changes that can cause condensation in the connectors. At the speed that we send data, I'm not sure how much we really NEED the twisted pair, or at least not at the cat5 level. I will do plenty of testing, subjecting the wire types I am looking at to various types and levels of interference to see what works and what doesn't before I make any commitments.
My experience on the *very* wet west coast is that RJ45 connectors well protected from direct rain or spray, for example under an eve, do just fine. My hubs are inside the recommended marine battery boxes, with the power supply fan moving the air regularly, I have not seen any condensation and zero tarnishing of the copper in the sockets. Connectors carrying DMX, PIXELNET & audio have shown little corrosion exposed to the elements as long as they were oriented to keep the rain out of the socket.
However, ALL connectors from the hubs to the SCCs that were exposed to rain, even those wrapped with electrical tape, corroded amazingly quickly and had to be replaced with waterproof connectors - the high current & seems to suck the moisture out of the air and eat the metal away.
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I'm curious now, why the 4 core on the actual hub?
At the speed that we send data, I'm not sure how much we really NEED the twisted pair, or at least not at the cat5 level. I will do plenty of testing, subjecting the wire types I am looking at to various types and levels of interference to see what works and what doesn't before I make any commitments.
I had 2 boxes of cat3 that were free so I used it to run my dmx controllers, couple of runs 75' plus and everything ran smooth. I did however use cat 5 on the pixelnet for the zues as well as my main wire from the dongle to the hub.
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I also have every intention of continuing using cat5 and the RJ45 jacks for Pixelnet and DMX feed lines.
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I am looking into using the 3 core and 4 core connectors for the SSC next year due to corrosion too.
I found on DIYC for about the same price as Cat5 costs me 18/4 stranded wire 500 ft ~ $47
http://www.ebay.com/itm/121025808177?ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1439.l2649 (http://www.ebay.com/itm/121025808177?ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1439.l2649)
by the way 3 - 24awg from cat5 strands = 19g
http://home.hiwaay.net/~rgs/awgcalculator.html (http://home.hiwaay.net/~rgs/awgcalculator.html)
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This is all great feedback. Thank you.
Sent from my SCH-I605 using Tapatalk
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I am looking into using the 3 core and 4 core connectors for the SSC next year due to corrosion too.
I found on DIYC for about the same price as Cat5 costs me 18/4 stranded wire 500 ft ~ $47
http://www.ebay.com/itm/121025808177?ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1439.l2649 (http://www.ebay.com/itm/121025808177?ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1439.l2649)
by the way 3 - 24awg from cat5 strands = 19g
http://home.hiwaay.net/~rgs/awgcalculator.html (http://home.hiwaay.net/~rgs/awgcalculator.html)
the wire is stranded, and so its good for some uses... but its not twisted pair, so it is not good for the hub-to-ssc run. You can use this wire for the ssc-to-pixel run -- but it should be no more than 6'. You can also use it for dumb string connections (DSC of MR16 connected to a bunch of dumb string pixels).
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Wow!
I am really glad I asked the question! This is a lot of great feedback.
Several years ago I made some RGB wall washes and used RJ45's for the connectors. Even in Dry Arizona I had trouble with corrosion!
I ordered 4 pin waterproof connectors so that I could change those out this year.
I like the Idea of using those 4 pin connectors out in the elements. I never have corrosion issues with my RJ45's for pixelnet or DMX, but it has not been good for my cables with power on them.
Thanks everyone for this great information to noodle on!
As I do more RGB I definitely look for your experience to help me miss out on mistakes that I could avoid!
Mike
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I brought in my equipment earlier in the week, and just now started to look over the first of the elements before putting it away for the year -- I've got some work to do. :(
The DMX connection over pigtails -- the only part of my display not using water-proof connectors -- suffered from the weather. This happened even though the connectors were pointed downward. I've got 16 aether2, all looking similar. Both input and output connectors had problems. Since I keep power on throughout the month, it looks like the charged wire attracted the moisture -- particularly the +12v wire.
(http://imageshack.com/a/img11/4549/7y57.jpg)
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I found on DIYC for about the same price as Cat5 costs me 18/4 stranded wire 500 ft ~ $47
http://www.ebay.com/itm/121025808177?ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1439.l2649 (http://www.ebay.com/itm/121025808177?ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1439.l2649)
the wire is stranded, and so its good for some uses... but its not twisted pair, so it is not good for the hub-to-ssc run. You can use this wire for the ssc-to-pixel run -- but it should be no more than 6'. You can also use it for dumb string connections (DSC of MR16 connected to a bunch of dumb string pixels).
At the speed that we send data, I'm not sure how much we really NEED the twisted pair, or at least not at the cat5 level. I will do plenty of testing, subjecting the wire types I am looking at to various types and levels of interference to see what works and what doesn't before I make any commitments.
I will be interested to see how much difference twisted pair makes at varying distances.
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The power leads didn't attract moisture; the voltage and current is probably high enough for some electroplating to occur - the gold plates off and then the underlying copper corrodes.
Tesla was right; we do need wireless power distribution. Now to figure out how to do it without setting cornfields on fire...
/mike
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When cutting the rj45 end off a cat5 cable and replacing with a 4pin connector, I'm assuming you're just soldering together and covering with heatshrink? How hard is it to make this connection?
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I've been using a product on all connections that Holiday Coro was selling called Corrosion X (Purchased from local boat dealer). Just completed inspection of 64 Cat 5/RJ45 connections with NOT one failure. 48 of these are on Holiday Coro's Corostar meaning they are in a dead space between the damp ground and the black coroplas base (very high humidy). The other 16 were in the open exposed to elements everyday.
Might also add that I've used the same Cat 5/RJ45's for the last 2 years with no problems.
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When cutting the rj45 end off a cat5 cable and replacing with a 4pin connector, I'm assuming you're just soldering together and covering with heatshrink? How hard is it to make this connection?
Yes, I cut off the connector, and soldered the pigtail to the end of the cat5 with shrink tubing.
See the write-up in the wiki for the wiring:
http://www.diylightanimation.com/wiki/index.php?title=4_Conductor#4-Core_Waterproof_connectors_used_with_Powered_Pixelnet (http://www.diylightanimation.com/wiki/index.php?title=4_Conductor#4-Core_Waterproof_connectors_used_with_Powered_Pixelnet)
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I inspected mine today, the ones that corroded before I got the Corrosion X are still corroded and will need to be cleaned again. The ones that never corroded in the first place are still pristine.
So in my location, spraying before the pigtails leave the comfort of the shop seems to solve the issue.
Alan
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I've had really good luck with the LOR waterproof Dangles.
Every sale i pick up more, at this point I think everything I have with an rj45 on it has been modified to use them (except for the RGB north poles).
I also dab dielectric grease across the contacts on the male ends as I am connecting everything.
http://store.lightorama.com/rjwada.html (http://store.lightorama.com/rjwada.html)
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What do they usually go on sale for and is there a time to expect the sale?
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Thats the best price I've ever seen on those.
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Dan, there is usually a spring sale but that is a free for all mad dash sale that usually ends in less than an hour.
You can sign up to be notified from the web site.
this was from 7/24 so the LOR summer sale I think they were shipped in about 2 weeks.
RJ45 Waterproof Dangle RJ45-WP-Dangle 12 5.59
Subtotal 67.08
Coupon discount -1.34(tryforfree)
Subtotal 65.74
Shipping 19.43
Tax 0.00
Total 85.17