240 V mods

[pircy]

Hi guys.  I was about to order some LE's but just wanted to make sure this is the right thing for me before I place an order.  I am in Australia so I have to make 240V mods to my Expresses - no probs with that.  The Wiki paints a pretty clear picture of how to mod them.  Right at the end of Appendix B - 240VAC Mod it states, "When complete, your LE is ready to be powered by and control 240VAC lights".  Now this is where I am confused.  I was looking at the adaptors for my lights and of course, the input is 240V 50Hz.  Cool, no probs there.  That makes perfect sense.  However below input it says output 24V  5.5Va  (230ma). 

So this is my query.  Can I power these lights with the Express.  Can I just make the mods in Appendix B and plug and play, OR, does this mean that once I make the mods it will output at 240V and since the output stated on the lights box is 24V, blow up my lights in some apocalyptic style explosion!

[rm357]

From your description, I'm guessing that your lighs have a power brick of some sort associated with them and that the lights themselves are actually 24v strings. A power brick should NOT be plugged into the output of any of the dimmer equipment from this DLA.

I'm curious about your lights - If they are 24v DC, you may be able to use an MR16 to do the switching and dimming after the power brick. I'm not sure if the MR16 can handle 24v DC or not...  If they are 24v AC, all bets are off.

RM

[smartcontrols]

Hi Pircy,

We do have many other 240 Volt members here that do successfully use the Lynx equipment. I am sure one of them will be on shortly to explain exactly how they do it.  Or you could PM one of them directly, incase by some strange chance they are not looking at the board today.

[pircy]

AT the  moment I have a range of 24V and 31V AC led light strings.  No I was not planning on plugging in any of the power transformers into the equipment as the controllers would power those.  Yah, I tried a few other 240v users and they directed me to this board as they were not sure either.

[RJ]

If the lights will run on 24v DC then I would recommend you use the MR16 LED controller board. This will give you 16 channels also but cheaper and smaller.

You just need a single source of 24v power like a 24v powersupply to power it all. You would remove the power packs from the light cord and hook up the leads to the light now to the output of the MR16 controller.

RJ

[pircy]

Ok, so as I understand it the Express will not meet my needs given the light strings I currently have.  I can however use these to power my 240v rope lights if I wish?  Am I right to assume that in the USA your light strings have a 110/120V input and output?

[KeithTarpley]

Greetings,,,

Most off the shelf lights do plug into 110 around here.  Everybody has that as a standard.

Keith

[pircy]

Sorry guys. I just realised that in my pre-new-years-eve daze I put all my rambling about the LE in the Freestyle forum.  My apologies!  Thanks for the help guys.

[ThaiWay]

Pircy... make the 240VAC mod to your LE's and plug in your 240V Rope and you're good to go!  I have three 240VAC LE's for my arches, using 240V 100ct M5 strings, and they're awesome.  (Thanks RJ for the addition of 50Hz firmware !)

RJ confirmed the suggestion I made in PM about the MR16/DC Controller.  Sell your 31V LED's on eBay.

Happy New Year!