What gauge of wire do I need if my led lights are 100 feet from my controller. I really want my controller in my garage and to have sections on my roof line, but the last section would be about 100 ft from the controller (green/blue). Is this a crazy idea? Having the controller in the garage makes sense to me instead of going through a window or such…
I am looking at 4 sections (orange, red, blue, green), so running wire for each section alongside each LED section, and each section would have 100 to 150 led bulbs.
“The gauge of wire to use” question is really about power not data.
You figure out the max current a section will use and how far the power supply is from that section.
A wire gauge calculator: Drop Calculator will tell you the voltage drop over the distance at the current you found for the size of wire you pick. You want the smallest drop you can get without going too huge on the wire. This is also why multiple injection points make things easier, you divide the total current needed into smaller pieces that are easier to deliver with smaller wire.
The distance from the MCU (Dig Quad) to the strip is a separate issue. Transmitting ~1Mhz data streams beyond a few meters can become a complicated issue and depend heavily on the data wiring and how you route it near/away from noise sources. At least the MCU has a level shifter, which saves an initial headache.
My go to solution is TxRx differential (RS485) pairs. The data wiring is simple, you need two wires plus a ground, and can be very immune to noise and distance issues. 100m runs are commonplace for many applications and they’re pretty cheap, $2-3 per pair.
