Anyone using LED tape lights?

[rick carpenter]

How are y'all rigging up "built-in" (hidden) power to your LED tape lights? I want to put some of these under my kitchen cabinets tied to the kitchen light switch. A junction box tied to the overhead light? That would be easy enough to do and then run the wires down through the cabinets. Or should I somehow tie it in to the switch itself?

 

[Wirepuller]

For low voltage I'll run a switched 2 wire to the to the room that contains the lighting controls to mount the transformers. Another 2 wire out to the tape light. The stuff I'll usually get only has a pig tail to splice to at the end of it. I hate doing it but sometimes when using it for under cabinet lighting I have to make a splice and push it back into the wall, leave enough to pull out to access it in the future. if using it as indirect lighting and you don't see the tape light itself I'll mount a 500 series wire mold junction box.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[fartymarty]

I've seen some here(?) and on YouTube make DIY light strips using the cheap Amazon/eBay LED tapes. My advice to anyone else is don't bother. For accent lighting OK, for general lighting no. If you still want to try, at least use the 5630 tapes and not the 3528 tapes that I used. You may still be disappointed but at least your project will be brighter than mine.

I slapped some wood strips together using wood glue and staples.

Then I applied some 3M double stick foam tape using a wallpaper seam roller.

Then attached three strips of LEDs in an admittedly haphazard manner but my old man hands don't do well with all that sticky stuff so things aren't exactly straight.

Then I spliced up the wires and tested it with a 12vdc power supply I already had on hand, and.....

....pretty disappointing , but in for a penny in for a pound. So I installed it on the ceiling and it didn't look any brighter up there.

My cell phone camera makes it look brighter than it really is, but if you look at the photos below when the other lights are on, it sort of just...adds almost nothing.

So no, I don't recommend LED tapes. If you want cheap lights, just get the cheapest fluorescent shop lights you can find (which usually come without tubes) and then get the cheapest LED tubes you can find that will work with an electronic ballast or ballast bypass. They will put out a lot more light than LED tapes and be less work, they come on full bright almost instantly and work great in the cold. That's my opinion and it's worth at least what you paid for it.

 

[Lelandwelds]

Thanks for photos. I just KNEW they would light up better than that. I guess not. I think it'll be part of the mix. I think the stuff is too good not to use.