LED controller killed in the Conservatory - unknown weapon Ask questions and find answers to many subjects relating to electrics and electrical work

[chrisrr7]

I'd really welcome any suggestions as to what killed this device please! Brand new LED, RGBIC setup. Dotless LED strip with power supply and wi-fi and BT controller. As usual, these kits and setups require an awful lot of bulk in terms of plugs, cables, power bricks and controllers etc, so I was trying to separate and tidy all of these bits up by extending the thin 2-core wire that comes out of the power adapter to a distant plug socket, thereby separating some of the clutter. My idea was to cut into the electrical wire that comes from the power brick to the controller by cutting into it and rejoining it with some white wire (also 22 AWG wire) to replace the conspicuous black wire. This would extend that wire, and also make it invisible (almost) as it would route its way along the edge of the white UPVC conservatory structure. I had cut into this 2- core cable, connected up the white wire to it, making sure I've got the cables matched up to the pattern on the original wire cores, switched it all on - LED strip doesn't work. I've checked that the LED strip itself does work, and I've also checked the power brick works. However, the Wi-Fi and Bluetooth controller is dead. Why? I was ultra careful in making sure I've got the polarities correct, so all I've done is added on an extra piece of 2-core wire to the outgoing wire from the power brick and I would've expected it to be a simple operation, but no. Failed miserably. Any thoughts?
(Power adapter: Output 24V 100--240v 50/60Hz 3.0A 72.0W)

[ericmark]

I had a wallmart fail with one of mine, and using a meter was a problem as with no load they shut down, but had two the same so swapped bits to test.

How are you testing?

[chrisrr7]

Hi Ericmark, thanks for your reply.
Not sure what you meant but I'm testing the strip by swapping it into an exact same, working setup, testing the power adaptor with a tester and it shows 23 Volts, but swapping the supplied inline "controller" (a little white blob of plastic that has a kind of branch off the body that is the IR sensor, a branch that receives the power input from the brick, and a branch that snaps onto the end of the led strip - it also has a button that you press to turn it on, and cycle through lighting 'modes', and a small hole that I assume is the mic to pick up the sound of music) into the working setup gives the same failure. Interestingly, using the iPhone app to pick it up and manage it, no longer finds it anymore, but checking my Bluetooth connections on the iPhone shows it picks up and connects to "TY" which is the controller. "TY" is probably the signature of the maker of wi-fi/BT controller: TUYA, the manufacturer of the controller. So I'm assuming something about what I did killed the WiFi but not the BT - but why would extending the wire from the power adapter kill anything?

[ericmark]

I looked up TUYA and it seems they use Zigbee, I also use Zigbee for one of my RGB strip lights, the idea of Zigbee is each item can act as a repeater for the next, so the power required for the RF link is very low.

My zigbee controller was from the internet, the lamp from Lidi and internet comes from Sky, and the voice control is with Nest Mini's. We have had Nest Mini's fall over and need a reboot, the zigbee hub has been fault less, but with a fault we have so many items with three hubs, and some direct that we would quickly know if fault was in the device or hub or voice control.

The worst we have is the first we got, Energenie MiHome which have failed out of 18 devices, 4 have failed, now replacing with TP-Link (Tado) but to be fair first 3 years no problems, then in quick succession lost 4 devices, then seemed to behave its self again.

With the TCP one power supply failed, swapped with no problem from Screwfix, the unit as said came as power supply, controller and actual strip, we have two so swapped bits to find out what had failed.

I know the Tado does PIR units, but not used, the big problem is to work out what will do what, my Tado light switch has a dusk and dawn setting, as does the TCP, but they don't work the same.

Wiz bulbs have a fade in and out, it seems each make and device be it a switch, bulb or relay has plus and minus points, the problem is having 5 apps on the phone. Although all work with the google home app once they have been installed.

Testing can be a problem, a switched mode power supply will close down with no load, so trying to work out where there is a break is a problem.

This forum is not good for posting pictures, I use Faststone photo resizer to make the photos small enough, this is my display cabinet. [attachment=0]20230227_170900_1.jpg[/attachment] I have not needed to extend any part, outer lights TCP inner light Lidi.