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Hello,

This is my first experience with DMX lighting, so please bear with me if my questions seem dumb or my approach is all wrong. I am setting up a run of DMX lighting for a Club that will be permanent. I have 5 Models of fixtures, 3 Parz1003k Spots to light up the stage, 2 Mega barRGBAs, an H20 water effect,  8 Par12 cans, and 2 other light bars. I'm using a hardware controller in the DJ booth about 50' from the 1st fixture, which is a Par can. With only the 1st fixture connected it responds correctly to the controller, I can dim it, set the mode of operation etc so I know the home run to the controller is OK. When I connect the rest of the fixtures it acts all wonky, and no longer responds to the controller correctly, with some pars strobing etc. I want the 8 Par cans to be in sound active mode, and don't intend to program chases or anything fancy, so I addressed them all as 1. I then addressed the pair of lightbars near the stage as 17, then the other light bars at the other end of the dance floor as 33, the H20 effect as 49, and the spots from left to right 65,81,97. I have checked for bad cables (I found one and fixed it) but it still doesn't work when I hook them all together. The spots are 5pin (the only 5 pin fixtures I have) and I'm using a converter I bought to send signal into the 1st spot. I soldered one cable into a converter to go from 5pin out to the next 3 pin fixture in the run, respecting the pin order 1,2,3, and not using the 4 or 5 pin for anything. Whenever I connect the spots things get funky. Even with the spots out of the circuit the lights don't behave correctly. I am feeding the DMX cable down through the ceiling over the dance floor through a 1 1/4" hole that also has the power cable through it. I used proper shielded DMX cable to make the cables, could those few inches of cable near each other be causing my trouble, or have I made errors in how I'm addressing the different fixtures. Sorry for such a long post, but I'm trying to include all of the information to get to the root of the problem. Thanks for any help you can provide. (The controller is an Obey40)

 

 

Original Post

***Update*** I removed the 8 Par lights from the DMX run and put them in sound activated mode, ran the home run from the controller to the 1st Stage spot, then connected it to the 2nd, then that one to the 3rd, and ran the out from the last Stage spot to the H20 effect. They all behave correctly. I also put the Mega Bar RGBA in sound active mode and slaved the 2nd one to it, same with the other light bar. It works that way, but I don't have as much control as I'd have liked. I'm also not sure how to make the dimmer on channel 1 only affect a particular fixture, right now it dims all of the fixtures. I'm thinking maybe I need to set each fixture to the desired brightness and save that as a look or scene?

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