Introduction: How to Solder Wire to LED Strip Lights

By Ecolocity LED
About: We carry high quality LED Lighting products and provide the highest level of customer service. Let our knowledgeable and friendly staff help you with your next LED lighting project.

This is a quick tutorial on how to solder LED Strip Lights sold by ecolocity.com

Step 1: Step 1 - Make Sure You Have a Clean Solder Iron

A clean solder iron is going to make all the difference in the outcome of your LED Strip Light soldering. A clean solder iron gives you a clean solder joint, be sure to clean your solder iron regularly using a wet sponge or a steel dish washer pad.

Step 2: Secure Your LED Strip Light

Use a few pieces of masking tape to secure your LED Strip Light to ensure no movement during soldering.

Step 3: Tin Your Stranded Wire

Once your soldering iron is hot enough, tin your 18-22AWG stranded wire by applying a small amount of solder directly to the stranded wire. Once you have completed this step your wire should be silver in color and no longer appear to be stranded.

Step 4: Tin the Copper Dots on the LED Strip

Melt a small piece of solder directly to the copper pads on your LED Strip Light, be sure that there is plenty of space between your solder joints to avoid electrical arcing.

Step 5: Solder Your Wire to the LED Strip Light

Once you have tinned both your stranded wire and your LED Strip Light you can now solder the two together. Simply place the wire over the copper pad and then use the solder iron to melt the two together. Be sure to heat both solder joints or you may result in a cold solder (where only one joint melts) which does not conduct electricity.

Step 6: Test Your Connection

Once you have solder the necessary wires to your LED Strip Light you can now test your connection using the proper DC power source.

Step 7: Apply Heat Shrink

Once you have tested your connection you can now apply a piece of heat shrink over the soldered connection to protect the joint and also be sure that no electricity is conducted from the bottom side of the copper pads, if adhered to a metal surface.