XMas lights

[Snow Crash]

Now I'm not saying I went xtreme or anything but I got 2 hours into it yesterday and then this morning my lovely wife (she really is) wants a different new setup. 6 hours later I also most went all "griswold" on it's asci :rofl:

Post up you experiences and maybe even some pics :up:

[Sparky]

I have nothing. Zip, zero, nada. I should probably do something about that.

[Gamekiller]

You guys ever noticed how much power the incandescent Xmas lights use? :shock: A 50 bulb set uses around 20 watts I think.. whereas LED Xmas lights use about 14w for 210 lights or something around in there. (Though it depends on the LED set's operation frequency.)

Our Christmas tree with built in old style lighting with a lit crystal star topper uses 250w! That's around ten 100w equiv. cfls. :o

Edit: I think buying a kill-a-watt made me power nazi around the house... approaching Christmas and now I'm turning into the power saving Grinch. :rofl:

[my87csx481]

LMAO at the power nazi comment....almost spit on my monitor:up:

It's giving me chills thinking about what my parents did and how much it would cost to run today.....

I have no idea on the number of lights but, it was four 10'+ tall spruce trees outside, all the way around, using the C9 bulbs and the tree inside using C7 bulbs:shakes:

I guess that probably dates me huh? Oh well.

Pic incoming in a bit....

Edit-nevermind. camera and I both suck at night shots.

[Sparky]

I looked at the LED strings for my place, but when I did the math on power savings vs initial cost of the LED strings vs standard, it was going to take several years before I'd break even lol. So I doubt I'll get LED strings.

[Johnmark]

I can remember a LOT of years ago using string after string of C9 bulbs on the house and trees in the yard. Darn near crapped my pants when the electric bill came, heck the kids had to eat left over's for the next month :)

I've gone to c7 LED lights on the house and they are pretty pathetic, darn near have to be in the front yard to see them they are so dim. I guess a person could go with the high baller type that cost $35 for a 7ft string, and maybe they use brighter LED's.

But I'd just as soon put some LED fans in all my case's and put them in the front window :) All seven boxes lined up in the bay window with a few ornaments on them should look good, right guys ?? Hurry and answer before my wife implements her plan lol

[Gamekiller]

The price/power usage/brightness with LED strings all seem tied to how fast they flicker on and off.

I bought a fairly cheap c6 LED string at lowes and it seems fairly bright. 52.2ft/210 leds/14.4W. I like the cool white color temperature and the fact that they don't heat up. This set flickers at a pretty slow rate and it's very visible to the eye at close distances but from a distance it's fine. From what I can tell, this slow flicker rate reduces brightness and power usage.

"Non-rectified LED Christmas lights flicker at a rate of 60 hertz per second. Although 60 hertz is very fast it is still dectable by the human eye."
"Higher quality LED light sets are fully rectified. This means that the lights turn on and off at a rate of 120 hertz per second. Although these lights sets still flicker like the non-rectified sets, they flicker so fast that it is not detectable by the human eye. The rectified LED lights also are about 30-40% brighter. The only downside of the rectified LED sets is that they are slightly less efficient. This is because the LED is illuminated twice as much as it flickers at double the rate of the rectified sets. However, the decreased efficiency is nominal."

[Sparky]

I'm finding another annoying problem with LED Christmas lights - many of them I'm finding have some stupid controller for all sorts of "flashing and chasing" modes, which 1) is annoying and 2) means they can't be connected end-to-end. That's a deal breaker for me there because I would need to be able to plug them into each other. The ones I did find that are just a simple plug on each end also cost a whole lot more. Bugger.

If I had more time/money to play with I'd buy a few sets of the controlled LED strings anyway and mod them to work the way I want :D Maybe another year.

[OldChap]

soldering iron, resistors, and monotony plus a pack or two of these

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/170654711910?ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1423.l2649

During the course of the year you could install the whole front of the house ready for next year (yes I need to get out more)

[Sparky]

Permanently installed Christmas lights? Hmm... interesting.

I rent though, so I can't do that :p: And what if you wanted to change the theme up a little bit one year...

[D_A]

The price/power usage/brightness with LED strings all seem tied to how fast they flicker on and off.

I bought a fairly cheap c6 LED string at lowes and it seems fairly bright. 52.2ft/210 leds/14.4W. I like the cool white color temperature and the fact that they don't heat up. This set flickers at a pretty slow rate and it's very visible to the eye at close distances but from a distance it's fine. From what I can tell, this slow flicker rate reduces brightness and power usage.

"Non-rectified LED Christmas lights flicker at a rate of 60 hertz per second. Although 60 hertz is very fast it is still dectable by the human eye."
"Higher quality LED light sets are fully rectified. This means that the lights turn on and off at a rate of 120 hertz per second. Although these lights sets still flicker like the non-rectified sets, they flicker so fast that it is not detectable by the human eye. The rectified LED lights also are about 30-40% brighter. The only downside of the rectified LED sets is that they are slightly less efficient. This is because the LED is illuminated twice as much as it flickers at double the rate of the rectified sets. However, the decreased efficiency is nominal."

60 Hertz is sixty cycles per second, that's what "Hertz" means, it is not sixty cycles per second per second (which is the rate of change of a measured frequency).

All LEDs operate on DC, the flickering you see on cheap LED strings is due to half wave rectification. Rectification being a manner of changing alternating current to direct current, in the case of half wave rectification it becomes pulsed DC. Full wave rectified DC (even with the most rudimentary of filter capacitors in the circuit) does not flicker, it is just on albeit with some ripple. LEDs operate over a very narrow and low voltage (and current) range and the basic requirements for their operation mean that they cannot be connected directly to an AC power source without rectification and regulation of some form. Remember that LEDs are DIODES and only operate with current flowing in one direction, they just happen to emit light while that current is flowing and are engineered to enhance that effect.

[Johnmark]

60 Hertz is sixty cycles per second, that's what "Hertz" means, it is not sixty cycles per second per second (which is the rate of change of a measured frequency).

All LEDs operate on DC, the flickering you see on cheap LED strings is due to half wave rectification. Rectification being a manner of changing alternating current to direct current, in the case of half wave rectification it becomes pulsed DC. Full wave rectified DC (even with the most rudimentary of filter capacitors in the circuit) does not flicker, it is just on albeit with some ripple. LEDs operate over a very narrow and low voltage (and current) range and the basic requirements for their operation mean that they cannot be connected directly to an AC power source without rectification and regulation of some form. Remember that LEDs are DIODES and only operate with current flowing in one direction, they just happen to emit light while that current is flowing and are engineered to enhance that effect.

Kinda sounds like you have a little electronics knowledge D_A :) Sooo is there a way to tell if I'm buying good bright LED Christmas lights ? i.e. the ones that have been engineered to be brighter and used as lights.
A majority of the LED's I see in stores are made in China so one doesn't have a clue as to quality.

[OldChap]

This page might not answer all questions but on it there are some very good links to stuff like calculating resistor values and approximations for comparing candelas and lumens (and what the difference is)

http://www.superbrightleds.com/cgi-bin/store/index.cgi?action=DispPage&Page2Disp=%2Fled_info.htm

Once you have read this lot if you still have questions .. I will give it a go.

The light brightness for led's is usually quoted in mcd (milli candela) and sometimes the colour is in nano meters (peak) There IS a relationship between a colour temperature and the peak wavelength in its spectrum. It's called Wien's law.

Wavelength (nanometers) = 3,000,000 / Col temp (Kelvin). BUT when you are talking white led's I still believe that like flourescent tubes you need to see them in action just to be sure that in any instance the higher K value denotes a cooler white

[D_A]

Kinda sounds like you have a little electronics knowledge D_A :) Sooo is there a way to tell if I'm buying good bright LED Christmas lights ? i.e. the ones that have been engineered to be brighter and used as lights.
A majority of the LED's I see in stores are made in China so one doesn't have a clue as to quality.

Which brand/model is best will vary wildly between markets, but I would't touch the Chinese made stuff with a 40' pole if it's goring to run for more than a few minutes at a time. These things, if they go REALLY bad, can burn your house down while you sleep. It's not the place for gear made with the absolute cheapest possible materials by people who's first consideration is not getting beaten to death by the foreman for costing too much money. Christmas is also the time of year when the worst of the worst hits the market and every single year there are product recalls from retailers over stuff that's found to be toxic, explosive, flammable (when it's specifically prohibited ie kid's sleepwear), easily breaking to choking size parts or just plain dangerous. My point being, if you're going to set up a large display on your house buy good quality gear, don't skimp on it.
Using the info from OldChaps's link you can work out how much power a given light string SHOULD draw. Then if you look at what it says on the packaging you can see what they say it really DOES draw. Compare the two and you can tell two things right away 1-the efficiency of the system (power out v power in) and 2-if the manufacturers are outright liars (claim it pulls way less than it possibly could ) and should be avoided.

[Sparky]

Good luck finding a string of LED lights not made in China :(

[D_A]

Then the best you can do is go for items with solid warranties and sturdy construction ... or learn how and build your own.

[Sparky]

Well I know I said I wasn't going to get LED lights. But I did anyway. They were on sale at the store for almost the same price as the good quality standard ones. Sure, they had the $2 100 bulb strings but I've seen those before and they are utter crap - crappy sockets, crappy bulbs, crappy wiring, just crap.

So I have a few strings of LED lights that I need to put up now.

Oh, they were all made in china - LED or traditional incandescent - so that ended up being a moot point. My snow shovel and ice scraper I bought were made in the USA however :D

*edit* well crud, I may be taking these LED lights back. They aren't full rectified so they flicker at 60Hz. It drives me bats just like an old CRT! Bah.