Good luck. Read my post from Nov. 2021…
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Hi! How are the lights holding up? Just found this post, thanks!
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I recently purchased the WYZE Light Strip Pro and needed to bridge a gap between kitchen cabinets. I bought the Zhengmy 20 Pack Solderless LED Strip Connector (https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BG1DMRG3). It comes with 16.4’ of bare wire, along with 3-pin connectors. One end of the connectors accepts in the WYZE strip you cut (have to peel back the waterproof covering a bit to get to just the strip), then close down the connector lid, which pushes metal contacts into the strip to make contact with the copper inside. You then peel apart the three red/green/white wires, so you can put them into the other side of the connector, then close it down. Do the same with the other side (making sure the different color wires are contacting the same part of the strip (i.e. if red wire is in “GND” on one end, make sure red is in “GND” on the other end). I ran the wire to the other cabinet and made the other connection, and after plugging the strip back in, it works perfectly! See my Amazon review on that product mentioned above for pictures too.
The controller is in the corner closet with the two 16’ sections running left and right. The left side is cut in 2 places, and right side in 4 places, with either extensions or bent wire 90’s at the wall corners, bridging windows, doors or gym equipment. We’ll see how this holds up, but I don’t plan on moving or changing anything so I don’t foresee any future problems.
I recommend taking your time planning on where to cut along the 4" increments (designated cut locations), take your time with the connectors ensuring the strip segments and wire are centered and straight before clamping them down. I used needle nose pliers to clamp. I also used masking tape to pull the dust off my mounting edge and the LED strip’s 3M adhesive stuck like a champ (mounted to rough cut cedar board).
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Lights are working great! Shortly after I installed and posted the pictures I was fidgeting with one of the joints and lost part of the middle string. I found a short in the extension line I ran from the first to the second segment around my weight rack. I remember pulling the cord through and it was hanging up on parts of a bracket. The edges were a little sharp and must have nicked the cable shielding. Take your time with the install for sure. These joints are in a static installation, so I don’t see how they can fail. I think if you’re wanting to use them in a situation where you’re moving them around, I can see how the joints may work loose over time. The fittings are just 3 pins that crimp into foil thin circuitry.
Being in a kitchen, grease is a given. Installing light strips on new cabinets is best. I used alcohol wipes to clean the cabinets where the strips would be mounted. They have been up for over 2 years (Philips also uses 3M tape)
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THIS is a great tip. I duplicated that part here, so emphasize it for others to see and hope they remember. Really smart.
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Hey PBRme….thanks for posting this. I’m doing an under kitchen cabinet installation. I figured out the wire side of the connector. I have a question on the light strip end. After peeling back some of the silicone coating, do the “teeth” of the connector come up into the the light strip from the sticky side (back) or do they go in from the light side (top)?
Thanks a bunch!
I installed mine pushed thru the back, that way the snap down cover is free if you need to service it. The teeth push through the strip so it doesn’t matter which way you go as long as it’s the same way for the entire string.
Thanks! Project for the weekend!!
Sounds like a fun project. Are you including motion sensors of some sort to turn on/off the under cabinet lights too?
Not really. Just planned on using Alexa.
Alexa, eh? That’s great. That’s perfect. I too use a set of Alexa supported LEDs under my cabinets, and an Alexa supported kitchen light switch.
If you put an Echo Dot 4th or 5th in your kitchen, you can enable the ultrasonic (person detection) feature. And create a routine that will turn the lights on and off at detection. Fun to play with until you tweak just the right combo of settings to suit your needs.
Best part is the “sensor” power is in the Echo Dot, and you don’t need to wire anything else into the setup.
Oh great!!! Now I HAVE to get one of those!!
I use mostly Echo and Wyze everywhere…although I do have a set of Govee lights on the back of my tv.
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I have a Echo or Echo Dot in every room, including front porch and garage. (Catch them on sale during Prime Days for instance. Usually $22/23 or so). I even have 3rd gen Dot’s in my house and garage attic. I seldom get in my attic with my cell phone. I can use my voice and any Dot to call 911 or a friend for help if I need them.
You know those “I’ve fallen and can’t get up” commercials? A new or old Dot for every home, every senior citizen, for where you can’t get up and reach a phone is a great alternative and emergency tool, along with the other features they have. 'Bout $20 a room for insurance? Good idea, IMHO.
I do have an Echo or Echo show in every room except in the guest room where I have an older Dot. Even have one in the garage. Great for listening to music while working out there. Hadn’t thought about the attic. Great idea. Picking one up next time they are on special.
Thanks for the idea!
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I used Wyze light strips for under and over cabinet lighting. They work great.
Recently I did under, over, and in cabinet.
Enjoy your project!
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It’s been over a year since my installation, so I wanted to chime in with my own experience, because I consulted this thread while planning my project.
To provide direct input to your question, @russ.sixsigma, I was using the Wyze Light Strip (not Pro) and settled on a kit with 4-pin connectors and wire that met my needs almost perfectly, and I followed the advice I read in several reviews that suggested poking the “teeth” (as you wrote) from the side with the LEDs (the top), though @PBRme’s advice might make more sense, depending on your hardware and application. (I say “almost perfectly” because I used every bit of the wire and had four connectors left over when I was finished.)
I think @PBRme’s advice about having the snap-down cover available makes sense, but that’s not what I did. Since I was poking the connector contacts through from the top of the strip (based on Amazon reviewers’ advice) and planned to hot glue the connectors to the underside of the kitchen cabinets, I anticipated having those snap-down covers glued to a flat surface, and that’s worked out exactly as expected. I also used hot glue to sort of “spot-weld” the strips to the cabinets at certain points, not really concerned about what it would look like when viewed directly. (You have to get below the cabinets to see the actual strips, anyway.)
In my project, I was using a 10 m Light Strip (i.e., the 32.8’ strip with the controller in the middle). One half of the strip needed a cut with connectors and wire to span the kitchen sink area; the other half had two cuts with wire and connectors to fill out the “L” where the cabinets met in a corner and to span the oven and microwave area. I really wanted to use Wyze Light Strips because I was doing this project in my parents’ kitchen and they already used Wyze and Google Home devices, and I wanted to make this an easy-to-use integration for them. They were pleased with the final result, so I consider it a success.
Like I said, I consulted this thread (and others) while planning my installation. While I genuinely appreciate the experience and input provided by @K6CCC and others who suggest soldering the connections instead of using solderless connectors, that’s not something I wanted to attempt for cabinets that were already in place.
That makes sense to me, as well, and it makes me wonder if @K6CCC’s experience with synchronized Christmas light shows involves moving his installations around (as I write that, I do realize that a strip or set of strips may be static to a given production piece, but I also imagine that those pieces are moved into and out of storage seasonally, so an installation as a whole wouldn’t necessarily be considered static). In that kind of setting, I agree that you’d absolutely want a more durable connection. In my case, though, I don’t expect these cabinets to move, so I wanted to share my positive experience with connectors that have been in place and working for a year. Hopefully someone else’ll find this helpful!
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Yes, most of us doing Christmas lighting shows take down all or part of the show after the season. The other disadvantage we have is normally the connections are outside so weather is an issue.
I totally get that, and when you have a portable project like that where you can set up pieces in a shop or other convenient workspace to solder connections, then making that kind of a more durable and permanent connection totally makes sense. For my own use case in a stationary setting, trying to solder these things in place and get them to fit in order to achieve the final result I wanted would’ve been a minor nightmare. Taking time with the wiring and solderless connectors and securing everything for a static installation has worked for me for a year now.
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