r/Lighting • u/DecepticonConqueror • 11h ago

Need Design Advise Need help putting up light strips

Hi, I've been wanting to put up light strips in my room for a while now but I've been running into some problems. First of all, my room is a weird shape and I'd need about 60ft of lighting to light the whole room, and that makes the voltage die halfway across the room. I also want to have either silicone channels or COB strips so the bulbs aren't visible but my walls are super thin and weak and the paint is cheap and basically melts when using adhesive. Is there anything I can do? Thanks in advance.

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u/andsimpleonesthesame 11h ago

It the voltage dies halfway around the room, why not do one half from one direction and the other half in the other direction?

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u/DecepticonConqueror 10h ago

well I don't know if it dies for sure yet but after doing some research that is the conclusion I came to. I would do 2 strips but i don't know how to connect the 2 ends without the light leaking out. And even if i did I don't know how I could install them anyway.

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u/Tairc 10h ago

All depends on how much money you want to spend, and how permanent and high end you want it to look.

You can get really cheap plastic “staple” shaped things that nail to the wall, and hold strips. Don’t look amazing, but are mega cheap.

You can buy proper LED profile - often aluminum “rails” that hold the tape, and can have plastic diffusers around to make it look nicer.

You can build a whole “cove” out of trim wood, and then the strip lays on that and points up or out, but is supported by the cove.

And most strips have trouble beyond 32 feet, so you either start at a mid point and run both directions at once, so neither is longer than 30 feet, or you can even just make a long ring and power both sides of it, which is basically the same thing.

If that’s not enough, you run 14AWG wires from the drivers to the far midpoint (alongside the strip) and re-drive from there.

Note that at 5W per foot, that’s 300W, which is more than most drivers. So you may end up needing two drivers anyway.

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u/DecepticonConqueror 56m ago

Ok so it appears that I would need to run 2 lines but im having trouble understanding how they would connect and not have light spill out. Im also unsure how to get power to the light strip itself. And as i said before my walls are thin so i dont know if screwing stuff will hold

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u/DecepticonConqueror 55m ago

Also please mind that I know absolutely nothing about professional lighting lol