LEDs won't daisy chain... help!

[littlecabbage336]

Hi, all! I'm new here. I produce/ direct a show that is set in an historic house. Each scene happens in a different room and the audience goes room to room to see them all.

For lighting, we use LED strips and pars- 1 in each room. We have a control board (Leprecon 624) in a central room. We daisy chain the lights together and operate them from the board. Last year, our setup worked perfectly. This year, it won't. I have been troubleshooting for 3 days. I have swapped out units, cables, even the board, all with the same result: One light, directly connected to the board works perfectly. The second i plug anything into the DMX out, it stops working. It flickers, even with the master down, and won't respond to signals from the board. Each of my 5 lights works alone when plugged directly into the board, but as soon as i try to bring in a second one, kaput.
Before anyone asks, YES, they are all set for DMX mode and properly addressed and assigned the correct personalities.
I have ColorRail IRC strips (3 of them) and Chauvet Par-64 Tri-Bs (2 of them)

Right now, to get by, i have all the lights plugged into power strips that can be turned on and off with a simple switch, but that is not a good long-term solution. I've tried swapping out cables, and i've noticed some cables result in worse flickering than others, but i can't isolate a problem. The house may be old, but its electrical system is fine.

Has anyone ever encountered a problem like this before? Does anyone have any ideas? Any help is greatly appreciated!!!

 

[techieman33]

Do you have a terminator at the end of the dmx chain?

 

[littlecabbage336]

Do you have a terminator at the end of the dmx chain?

I don't, and i did wonder if that was the issue, since it's 300' of cable all told. But i didn't have one last year, and it worked then. I don't think the people who loaned me the equipment even have one!

 

[techieman33]

Pick one up and give it a try, they're cheap, under $10. Your always supposed to have one. DMX is a finicky bastard, it could work for years without a terminator and then all of a sudden sprout problems that installing one at the end of the line will fix.

 

[lwinters630]

Try putting a splitter to split the 5 zones off. This will reduce the total length of your run and stop some reflection.

 

[littlecabbage336]

Pick one up and give it a try, they're cheap, under $10. Your always supposed to have one. DMX is a finicky bastard, it could work for years without a terminator and then all of a sudden sprout problems that installing one at the end of the line will fix.

Terminator didn't work. At one point, early on in this process, I bypassed the first two lights and just ran #s 3,4, and 5 successfully. When I tried to add in light #2, it all went haywire. Yesterday, I attempted to do it again, and couldn't replicate the success. With the terminator in place, I ran my xlr cable directly to the 3rd light and was able to control the colors to some extent. But as long as the master was up, the lights in the chain were flickering constantly.
To further make my life difficult, one of the pars, when switched on last night, blinked white as it normally does, but then didn't turn on. When it finally did turn on a minute later, it was red instead of white. Starting to think my lights are just possessed.

What is a splitter and where do you get one?

 

[gafftapegreenia]

I just have to ask, are you using real 5 pin DMX cable? It looks like the ColorRail IRC only has 3 pin connections. If you are just using regular microphone cable instead of DMX cable, especially on such a long run, odd things can happen.

 

[lwinters630]

If you are just using regular microphone cable instead of DMX cable, especially on such a long run, odd things can happen.

How can I tell the difference between the 3 pin DMX and the XLR. I cannot see any labels or tags on them.