# help LED strip lighting voltage drop



## olossus (Jul 16, 2011)

I was wanting to run a 2000 foot piece of 12 volt DC LED strip lighting. The LEDs come in 16 foot rolls and draw 20watts and .4amps per roll. So doing basic math I would need 125 rolls of lights and a power supply that could handle 2500 watts and 50 amps. I was planing on running them in parallel so i was going to run two 6 gauge wires 2000 foot long each and just attaching the led strips to it every 16 feet. Now here is my question I need help with. I was worried about line voltage drop. i was wondering if there would be enough voltage at the end of the line to even power the LEDs. Or would i have to run 120volt AC line and then attach a AC/DC converter to each LED strip to drop it to 12volt DC. If i ran the 120 volt AC line 2000 feet with 50 amps drawing on it then by the calculator it would have 25 volts at the end of the line. Would a standard 120vAC to 12vDC converter even work if you were plunging it into a 25 volt a/c outlet?


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## McClary’s Electrical (Feb 21, 2009)

olossus said:


> I was wanting to run a 2000 foot piece of 12 volt DC LED strip lighting. The LEDs come in 16 foot rolls and draw 20watts and .4amps per roll. So doing basic math I would need 125 rolls of lights and a power supply that could handle 2500 watts and 50 amps. I was planing on running them in parallel so i was going to run two 6 gauge wires 2000 foot long each and just attaching the led strips to it every 16 feet. Now here is my question I need help with. I was worried about line voltage drop. i was wondering if there would be enough voltage at the end of the line to even power the LEDs. Or would i have to run 120volt AC line and then attach a AC/DC converter to each LED strip to drop it to 12volt DC. If i ran the 120 volt AC line 2000 feet with 50 amps drawing on it then by the calculator it would have 25 volts at the end of the line. Would a standard 120vAC to 12vDC converter even work if you were plunging it into a 25 volt a/c outlet?


 

There's no way you wanna buy a single power supply to run all that. I would run 120 volt feeds everywhere and have normal size power supply for every 250 watts (or close) of 12 volts you're using.


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## gold (Feb 15, 2008)

I would hire an Electrician before you miswire one of those transformers and kill yourself or even worse someone else.


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## 480sparky (Sep 20, 2007)

​


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## Rick567 (Mar 3, 2011)

Read the manufacturers instructions, it should tell you the lengths that you can use per circuit and what size conductors you should install. Also don't hesitate to call the manufacturer to ask specific questions for your installation.


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## ce2two (Oct 4, 2008)

480sparky said:


>


 :thumbup::clap:


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## Xjourneybenderx (May 31, 2011)

olossus said:


> I was wanting to run a 2000 foot piece of 12 volt DC LED strip lighting. The LEDs come in 16 foot rolls and draw 20watts and .4amps per roll. So doing basic math I would need 125 rolls of lights and a power supply that could handle 2500 watts and 50 amps. I was planing on running them in parallel so i was going to run two 6 gauge wires 2000 foot long each and just attaching the led strips to it every 16 feet. Now here is my question I need help with. I was worried about line voltage drop. i was wondering if there would be enough voltage at the end of the line to even power the LEDs. Or would i have to run 120volt AC line and then attach a AC/DC converter to each LED strip to drop it to 12volt DC. If i ran the 120 volt AC line 2000 feet with 50 amps drawing on it then by the calculator it would have 25 volts at the end of the line. Would a standard 120vAC to 12vDC converter even work if you were plunging it into a 25 volt a/c outlet?


Just run some 600 kcmil


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## BBQ (Nov 16, 2010)

olossus said:


> I was wanting to run a 2000 foot piece of 12 volt DC LED strip lighting. The LEDs come in 16 foot rolls and draw 20watts and .4amps per roll. So doing basic math I would need 125 rolls of lights and a power supply that could handle 2500 watts and 50 amps. I was planing on running them in parallel so i was going to run two 6 gauge wires 2000 foot long each and just attaching the led strips to it every 16 feet. Now here is my question I need help with. I was worried about line voltage drop. i was wondering if there would be enough voltage at the end of the line to even power the LEDs. Or would i have to run 120volt AC line and then attach a AC/DC converter to each LED strip to drop it to 12volt DC. If i ran the 120 volt AC line 2000 feet with 50 amps drawing on it then by the calculator it would have 25 volts at the end of the line. Would a standard 120vAC to 12vDC converter even work if you were plunging it into a 25 volt a/c outlet?



It is painfully obvious you are deep over your head. 12 volts, 50 amps, 2000' on 6 AWG. :laughing::laughing:

Check out this voltage drop calculator and see what you come up with.

http://www.nooutage.com/vdrop.htm

(Hint, it will take three sets of 750 kcmil copper conductors per leg just to stay under 10% drop, this would be tens of thousands of $ ) 


Keep in mind that for something like this you would want to do 'point to point' voltage drop calculations so you would start off with a very large conductor and keep reducing the size as you go further. 


I also agree that you will not run this from s single 12 volt power supply.


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## AWKrueger (Aug 4, 2008)

This guy souds like he's trying to set up a grow operation. I hate these types of questions....


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## BBQ (Nov 16, 2010)

AWKrueger said:


> This guy souds like he's trying to set up a grow operation. I hate these types of questions....


With LEDs?

Will that work?


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## McClary’s Electrical (Feb 21, 2009)

BBQ said:


> With LEDs?
> 
> Will that work?


None of the rooms I wired have leds...


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## kennydmeek (Sep 12, 2009)

Lol!!


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## Rick567 (Mar 3, 2011)

Xjourneybenderx said:


> Just run some 600 kcmil


Your not far off, I did some dc strip lighting that called for something like 1/0 for anything over 75 ft. Needless to say I put the transformers as close as possible.


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## Rick567 (Mar 3, 2011)

Oops, didn't read your post BBQ.


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## Speedy Petey (Jan 10, 2007)

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