Well we started our pond lighting system yesterday. I have a bunch of wire ordered and baseball is wrapping up so I will have more time.
First thing we did was wire up the dock. The lights we used are underwater LED lights. 24volt, stainless steel, 36 watts total each, 12 watts per channel or RBG, DMX512 compatible.
We wired up the two into one cat5 wire 8 wire capable of 1 amp each. We only needed 1.5 amps of DC power for each lamp. 24volts/36watts=1.5amps. Each DMX line only needs 5volts and milliamps, so only three wire needed for DMX. We used two wires for 2amps on - and + of DC for a total of 4 wires and 3 wires for the DMX.
Wired our 84 watt DC power supply into a 15 amp AC GFCI breaker for safety. Then into a 24 volt dusk/dawn (still need to wire this up today) just wired direct no switch for now. This means the 24 volt PSU will stay powered up 24/7 and the load in 24volts will be switched. There is some phantom load but very little with the PSU live 24/7.
Here is a few pictures of the lights. I am really really impressed how well they bring in the bait fish. You can see some minnows in the pictures but a picture doesn't show how brilliant or impressive the lights really are. I can see now why in Canada it is against the law to fish with a light.
Main reason for the lights was for swimming and for lighting up the pond. We have 2~18 watt 24volt RGB lights for the waterfall display and 16~3watt 24volt RGB lights for lighting up the trees around the pond. All will be DMX controlled so we can have them do different themes Christmas, Halloween, and so on. We even have a sound mic that we can have the lights run different colours with different sound tones for music sync.
Few pictures of the lillys I had to add too. They were on the camera.
OK here is a video of the lights tonight. The minnows are getting use to the buffet of bugs. My son was able to hand net a yearling perch looking to be the top dog of the pond. This little guy was trying for the 1-2" minnows.
The bugs were so thick I could barely breath and I did not need any thing to knock them into the water. The bugs would just wipe them self out into the water.