How to Use the Wall Mount PSU with LED Strips

2022-02-17 | By Kitronik Maker

License: See Original Project

Courtesy of Kitronik

By Kitronik Maker

Electrician’s Guide to using the wall mount 12V 5A power supply with LED strips

Overview

This is a guide aimed at people who have experience working with mains electricity ‎and are aware of the safety precautions that must be taken when working with high ‎voltage electricity. It describes how to use the wall mount power supply to power ‎up to 10M of LED strips.

DO NOT ATTEMPT TO WIRE ANYTHING INTO THE ‎MAINS IF YOU ARE NOT QUALIFIED – SERIOUS INJURY MAY OCCUR.‎

You will need:‎

A wall mount PSU
Some LED Strips, Red, Green, Blue, Yellow, or White
A two-way terminal block (recommended) or a 5A 2.1mm DC socket.‎

Step 1‎

Wire_1 ‎

Identify the (brown) live and (blue) neutral wires on the AC side of the terminal. ‎These can be connected directly to a light fitting or into a plug if you prefer.‎

Step 2‎

Plug_2 ‎

You can connect the plug on the DC end into a 2.1mm 5A rated DC socket, as ‎these are far more expensive than the low current version, we recommend cutting ‎the 2.1mm plug off and running the two wires into a 2-way terminal block.‎

Step 3‎

Polar_3 ‎ ‎

Connect the positive and negative terminals on your terminal block to the ‎corresponding positive and negative pads on the LED strip. If you are using a full ‎strip then wires will already be attached to one end so you can wire these straight ‎into your terminal, noting the polarity indicators where the wires enter the LED strip. ‎The pads are labelled with + and – signs as can be seen in the image above.‎

Connecting LED strips in parallel

If you wish to use multiple LED strips exceeding a total length of 5M you must ‎connect them to your power supply in parallel as shown in the diagram below.‎

LEDstrip_4 ‎

Notes

Cut lines are marked every 5cm along the LED strips, if you wish to shorten ‎a strip make sure you cut down the line and don’t damage the copper pads.
If you are connecting lengths of LED strips in series do not exceed 5m.
You can power a maximum of up to 12m of single colour LED strips from a ‎single 5A PSU if they are run in parallel.‎

A printable PDF of this guide can be downloaded here. Learn more about the ‎author read more »‎

‎©Kitronik Ltd – You may print this page & link to it but must not copy the page or part thereof ‎without Kitronik's prior written consent.‎