Multimeter use on bridgelux 1 foot setup

[clayts]

Sorry, I should have mentioned I already disconnected the dimmer and it read the same as with the dimmer maxed, about 4.5A.

What size wire are you using?

Yeah so I think this might be it. I'm running 18AWG from the strips to Wagos but 14AWG between Wagos. However, and I don't know why I did this, but I am running the 18AWG from the driver to the strips. Seems I stumbled at the last hurdle of this build haha.

I'm pretty new to this stuff and honestly starting from scratch with building stuff with my hands so I was super proud of myself that I got it all up and running with aluminium heat sinks and all!

But yeah, I'm surmising that the smaller gauge wire carrying all the current between driver and strips is increasing resistance at the 'start' of the circuit, thus decreasing current at the constant 20V.

Queation though, if the strips are still getting their 19.9-odd volts across each of them, I'm assuming that they are still actually pulling their associated current (according to the datasheet)? Ie. If I was to measure the current running through an individual strip, I'd see 0.5ish Amps?

I'll swap out the 18AWG wire at the start of the run for the 14AWG anyway, but just curious..

[clayts]

Hmm.

So I'm still getting the same result after changing out the 18AWG and replacing with 14AWG between the driver and the strips.

I've hooked up the multimeter in between each strip down the 'negative' side and their associated wago (3 strips go into each wago). All of them read around 0.6A, which is pretty much what I'd expect at this voltage.

Why then, do I only see 4.6ish amps to and from the driver? Should it not be the sum of all the current the strips draw? Which would be 12*0.6 =7.2A?

[LEDG]

Are they all connected and running when you're measuring each one individually?

[clayts]

Are they all connected and running when you're measuring each one individually?

Yep. So the wire from the strip goes into one side of the multimeter (via another wago) then the other side of the multimeter into the wago that the strip usually connects to. When I turn the light on, all strips are lit up and at max power it reads from 0.57 to 0.60 along all the strips.

The other thing is, I don't understand why if I measure what is coming in one end of the wagos it doesn't seem to equal the addition of the other currents attached to that wago. Ie if there's 4.6A coming in, and 1.8 (ie 3 strips at 0.6) there should be 2.8 going on to the next wago right? At the moment it's more like 3.6 going on through. I don't get it.. I feel like the strips are getting what they should, the measured current through the circuit isn't adding up

[QuantumMechanic]

I suspect that the currents don't add up because the meter isn't very accurate. In theory, all the current coming into the Wago is exactly equal to the sum of all the current going out. It should add up, But if the meter isn't correct, the errors will add up and make for a weird result.

What make and model meter are you using?