I have a new WLED project using a 100 LED WS2812B strip with a SP511E controller running WLED v0.14.1. I have a 5V 3A power supply and have limited the brightness in WLED appropriately.
From time to time (inconsistent), just over half the strip will glitch. It will either go out completely, change colour, or only a few LEDs will light up.
I can “fix” this simply by touching the data pin immediately to the right of the last working LED in the strip with a conductor, then it all starts working again for a while. I’m assuming I am grounding the connection somehow but I’m not exactly sure (I’m not electrically inclined).
Any ideas what the cause might be? See a gif showing the issue attached.
I’m new to WLED and LED light strips in general, although I am techncally inclined (just not electrically inclined).
I don’t have any other strips to try… but I’m thinking if it’s a strip problem I can cut out the problematic LED or LEDs. I just wanted to make sure I’m not missing something simple before I starting taking the strip apart.
Basically everything I know so far is in the first post. I only bought two items, the SP511E wifi controller and the WS2912B 1m strip. I used the original controller firmware for a while and it started glitching as described so I upgraded it to WLED, which I had planned to do anyway. That didn’t really help although it allowed me to (I think) rule out power by limiting the brightness.
I grabbed some wires to see if it was just a bad LED I could bypass, but as soon as the wires touched the strip it started working, which I found… odd.
Anyway it doesn’t sound like it’s something obvious so I’ll keep going with my diagnostics. Next I’ll try fixing a wire between the in/out data pins on the last good LED to see that works around the issue.
So basically faulty LEDs can result an Inconsistent data flow, distorted data output, A complete failure with loss of function or showing colors wrong or even don’t, The data passing through are getting amplified and modulated for maintaining a consistent data flow. Is this isn’t given it will or may causes flickering after that specific LED.
Out of curiosity tho. Did the flickering appear before or after that specific Section?
You’re having, what I call, the touch lamp effect.
Basically you’re acting like a static antenna.
Try taking a very high resistance resistor and bridge between the ground and the signal. Don’t touch the resistor when bridging as that would taint the results.
It’s also very possible you just need to reflow the solder on the last lit resistor output.
Thanks for the assistance. I’ve decided when I get a chance I’m going to cut out what I think is the bad LED and then re-connect them. I don’t have a resistor to test with but I did try using a small wire to bypass the LED and it didn’t work well.
