Soffit/Eave LED Lighting

[dipan]

Posted in the wrong subforum, this is where the previous eave lighting threads were. Sorry for the crosspost.

I have read the DIY LED eave lighting posts on this thread and am interested in doing something similar, but will not be DIY'ing the lights. I have selected locations around our relatively large house for 25, 40, and 60 degree optic'd 3 watt Cree XPE powered prebuilt recessed lights and have installed some of them. The fixtures themselves are from superbrightleds and look well made and appear to be have a cast aluminum body. Pretty well sealed but not waterproof or anything, but should be reasonably protected from rain by the soffit and overlying roof/gutters. These will be primarily accent and slight intruder deterrent type lights. We also have floodlights that will be motion triggered if someone decides to walk up to our property.

Here is the fixture:

I have drilled 2.5" holes with a hole saw in the thin plywood eaves/soffits and installed several of these, but not powered them up yet. The attic work is yet to be done. The fixtures look very clean installed. As there will be 25 x 3 watts of these, I decided to buy a 150 watt power supply from them for some headroom:

This will be mounted in the attic and powered by an automated outlet so I can set on/off times and other triggers if I want. I will be using 12 gauge landscape wire in the attic with landscape connectors to tap into the long wire without cutting and splicing at each light attachment. What's nice about the fixtures and not specifically stated or pictured at the vendor's site is that the "tail" wire is pretty long, I'm guessing around 4 feet, so it should be easy to grab the wire from the eave from within the attic without having to solder on a longer wire.

Now I do have some questions about wire length. I bought 12 gauge wire to minimize voltage drop (12v DC power supply), and will try to limit runs to 100 feet without having a parallel voltage "reinforcing" run to keep the voltage up. Any advice as to how long a run I should be able to have? I will try to loop the wire back to the power supply to additionally reinforce the voltage. I bought 500 feet and I'm thinking I will probably need all of it but am not sure.

Feel free to ask questions or offer up any other suggestions.

Thanks ...

 

[Steve K]

well, the first questions that pop into my mind involve volts and amps...

1.What is the voltage drop of each light module, and how are you wiring them to the power supply?
2. What is the output current and voltage rating of the power supply?

My assumption is that the power supply is current regulated and you've got all of the light modules wired in series. The total voltage drop across all of the light modules is (hopefully) less than the rated output voltage of the power supply, with some margin left for voltage drop in the wiring.

oh... you mention that the power supply is rated for 12v, so it's probably a safe bet that you've got the light modules wired in parallel. That means that you need to worry about matching the LED voltages (and I'm assuming that the LEDs are wired in series in each light module?) in order to equally share current between the light modules. A common practice is to include a small resistance in series with each light module to even out the current between modules. Your long wires on each module might serve this function... I'd stick a current meter on the modules to confirm this. Heck, it wouldn't hurt to wire all of this stuff together prior to installing it just to be sure that it works!

..first things first, though. Show us your wiring diagram, with the associated voltages and currents, and then we can offer some useful advice. Good luck!

 

[asimba2]

Those modules look nice--perhaps even nicer than my spice tins, haha! I would have definitely used something like that had it been available at the time I made mine.

Are those modules regulated? And for 12V or 120V? That will determine how they are wired. The eave lights I built are not regulated at all at the module, so they are wired in series behind a single 20W driver. One wire leaves the driver, travels around the house and back to the driver.

 

[dipan]

Those modules look nice--perhaps even nicer than my spice tins, haha! I would have definitely used something like that had it been available at the time I made mine.

Are those modules regulated? And for 12V or 120V? That will determine how they are wired. The eave lights I built are not regulated at all at the module, so they are wired in series behind a single 20W driver. One wire leaves the driver, travels around the house and back to the driver.

The modules are nice. They must have onboard drivers. The power supply feeds 12v DC to two very long parallel wired 500 ft loops that wrap around the eaves in the attic. I ran 12 gauge landscape wire and looped each of the two runs back to the PS to minimize voltage drop and to deliver as close to 12v to each light as possible. It all works! And looks great....

 

[nathank]

I'm wanting to do this exact setup. Do you have all your lights wired and working yet? Can you show some example pics of the differences between the 25, 40 and 60 degree installed lights?
Did the fixtures turn out to be weatherproof enough for this application?

 

[dipan]

I'm wanting to do this exact setup. Do you have all your lights wired and working yet? Can you show some example pics of the differences between the 25, 40 and 60 degree installed lights?
Did the fixtures turn out to be weatherproof enough for this application?

The fixtures are not specifically waterproof but seem reasonably shielded within the eave. I will get you some pics of the different focal lengths, but that part of the house is not completed yet so will take some effort.

 

[dipan]

25 degree optics in the following two pics, one daytime, the other night. As I see it, these are good for a nice narrow wall wash effect from a second story eave. Those 18' long ladders are scary.

 

[dipan]

40 degree optics examples below. Nice tight wall wash effect from a fist story eave. I did put some of these on windows as in the pic, but would not put them on a bedroom window. That's my garage under construction. :cool:

 

[dipan]

Since I like the tighter light cone look I did not use many 60 degree fixtures. This is a good example of a decent application for it though, an outside first level corner.

 

[dipan]

And an overall view at night of a handful of these fixtures:

 

[Norm]

dipan All of your images are oversize, when you post an image please remember Rule #3

Rule #3 If you post an image in your post, please downsize the image to no larger than 800 x 800 pixels.

Please resize and repost. - Thanks Norm

 

[dipan]

dipan All of your images are oversize, when you post an image please remember Rule #3

Rule #3 If you post an image in your post, please downsize the image to no larger than 800 x 800 pixels.

Please resize and repost. - Thanks Norm

Done as requested ...

 

[idleprocess]

And an overall view at night of a handful of these fixtures:

That's really sharp-looking!

 

[jamesmtl514]

Beautiful home.
What part of the country?

Nice lights too!

 

[dipan]

That's really sharp-looking!

Thanks! I thought so too. I think everyone should do this ...

Beautiful home.
What part of the country?

Nice lights too!

Thanks ... Coming to you from South Texas :)

 

[jerrykur]

HI,

I love these fixtures. Who is the manufacturer and where did you buy them?

Thanks!

Jerry

 

[dipan]

HI,

I love these fixtures. Who is the manufacturer and where did you buy them?

Thanks!

Jerry

Don't know the manufacturer, but I bought them off of superbrightleds.com (mentioned in the first post).

 

[298]

Any idea why I can't see your pictures? I want to do eave lighting but trying to find examples of the different types available