So I recently had time to get to building these things. Anyway, first go around a capicitor wasn't needed on my neopixel blade. Now something odd is happening. Using a tcss neopixel adapter, 24 awg on power lines, and 28 awg on data (470 ohm resistor), the board boots fine and the blade ignites. But now, after a few seconds and with color changing and lock up effects, some parts of the strips will act goofy. The strips will stop lighting up half way up on one side. The colors will lock or even stay on after powering down.

I've rewired the connector on both sides and I thought I fixed it until I charged up my battery completely. Turns out I only get functional strips when the battery is low. From reading a troubleshooting guide I've found that the power lines voltage can only be 1.43 times the data line voltage or esle the strips go wonky. So I'm imagining that with the battery fully charged the power spikes are causing the power voltage to be over 1.43x the data.

Am I on the right track here? Is this why a capicitor is needed to smooth out the power to the strips?

Thanks for reading. I'd love to know if this is the issue.