Plug and Play WLED controllers

Some of my earlier WLED installs failed, so I fixed them. Find out how

Links:

[puppetmaster]

I have found clear silicone caulk is great for putting up LED strips (and other stuff!) Get a tube and use it to stick up your strips using it like glue. You often don't need to run an entire bead of the caulk along the strip, but just put a few blobs along the strip at even intervals. You might have to hold the strip in place for a bit until the caulk bonds, but painter's tape works great for holding it in place until it is set. It stays fine through higher heat produced by monitors and such. But anytime you need to peel the strips off, you can, and the caulk can be peeled off most surfaces cleanly without leaving anything behind. I've used it to hold LED strips under kitchen cabinets (even the ones above the stove which get the cooking heat) and they have never fallen off. But I have removed them easily when I wanted to replace them with a different kind of LED strip and the caulk peels cleanly off the old strips and even the wood under the cabinets. I even use silicone caulk to stick little figurines on top of my monitor and they stay perfectly, but peel off cleanly with no damage to the monitor casing.

[timpeterson]

Quindor's controllers are epic, the Octo expandable one is so cool.

[starecmirec]

Man you made me a goosebumps with Winamp intro 😉

[wojtek-]

BTF-Lighting strips have never come off on any of my uses and I have even removed and reused them with no issues. They make good led strips if you don't want to mess with additional tape. I have been making my own controllers. Super cheap and easy if you can solder, especially if you need more than a couple. Those controllers add up quickly.

[Wysp_Sedai]

I too am a huge fan of the dig2go wled controllers!!! I'm so excited that I should be receiving another one this week to set up another corner with cool accent lighting. I've tried a few other brands/types of WLED controllers as well, but this one is by far the best one for small installations I've found

[thibmaek]

I install my led strips with nano tape, sometimes even just at certain spots and not the whole length of the strip. Strong adhesive, easy to get off and no residue

[mrbaglog]

Quick tip to remove the vhb tape: Take your very thin, flexible putty knife and give it a blast of spray-on vegetable oil (like Pam in the US). Will let your blade separate the adhesive from the surface and just leaves the surface a little shiny. Downside is that if you want to re-apply your removed thing, you now have to very very very thoroughly remove all traces of cooking oil, so this tip works better when you care more about the surface than what was stuck to it.

[PeterScargill]

About time someone came clean about the rubbish adhesive on nearly all LED strip - I've been known ro resort to staples when the adhesive finally fails on pretty much nany surface. I'm about to look up the adhesive you mentioned - hoping Amazon as it as I'm in the deep end of Southern Spain. You didn't say what you did with the original adhesive on the strip. Left it on? I've ordered some 9mm to try...

[markxexar]

I love it that you credit the MakeItWork channel. Way too few presenters give credit to any of their sources. I definitely agree with Dig2Go as a terrific controller. I have moved a lot of LED lighting away from 5V though, and it does not handle other voltages. All my Xmas and outdoor lights are on 12V with DigQuad. Indoors I have started using analog extra warm white lights. Quinled has some controllers coming soon and in the meantime I find Shelly RGBW2 does a great job for these. For indoor lights where I need color and long runs, I have standardized on 24V with a preference for FCOB with or without a white channel. These pair perfectly with the DigQuads.

[stevesanderson]

Great Video Alan, do you think the DigtoGo would run a 3meter strip the same as you have in your Kitchen video. I belive that is 60 LED/m. I can find a 30 LED/m on but it seems to be non waterproof that might not be great in a kitchen. Any intrested in your view, let me know what you think.

[HomeIsWhereTheSmartIs]

Hey, great video! My Dad and I are currently working on a really tiny board which uses an ESP32s3 and you can also power with just USB-C for lower length strips, or run the strip off a beefier power supply for longer ones. It runs his own software rather than WLED (although you could flash if you can get it working on an s3 chip) and it connects to Home Assistant pretty easily with auto discovery over MQTT. I’ll hopefully be doing a video of my own on it when we get the new batch of boards through 😊

[bassett_green]

Thanks for the consistent quality content :)

[jesperkuipers]

3:49 would be easy way to replace my current esp's that measure temps in the rooms, which automate the hvac and heating

[sandphotoNL]

I always prefer sticking things on in a non-permanent, non-damaging way, so I often resort to Gekko Tape (or nano tape). While I don't think it is very suitable for LED strips (but worth a try), it definitely can be used for the controller or other small devices. I have used gekko tape to attach Hue motion sensors to my ceiling for example. It may damage wall paint so first check. And use small pieces of gekko tape if you want to be able to remove it later without too much effort/damage. I mainly use the 2mm thick version. Give it a try.

[czappa]

Great vid! Exactly what I needed. Thank u.

[tomasdorda]

Thanks for the great video.
Would you mind sharing what monitors and stand do you use?

[usesap]

In terms of "Tunable Whites" -- Do you ever wish you used a RGBCCT type led strip as opposed to the typical ws2812b/sk6812 strips? I want to set up some accent lighting in my living room, but fear I might select the wrong sk6812 white color temp. I was considering ditching WLED option and opting for a zigbee led controller (GLEDOPTO) for 5 channel RGBCCT.

[EsotericArctos]

I find most adhesives on LED Strips are pretty bad, except for one brand I use a lot. BTF. BTF lighting use the 3M adhesive, which is rock solid and has lasted for years on my Plasma TV, which does get quite warm.

[sygad]

winamp, not heard that intro for an age

[moonified]

iirc, the dig2go also shuts off the power to the SK6812's when not in use, otherwise they draw more power when idle. This feature is available on all of the dig line of WLED controllers. Not sure about the other one listed in the video or not. Can you confirm ?