It's that time of year. Time to put up the Christmas lights and decorations. This is my wife's favorite time of year. She is putting out the boxes and boxes of Christmas propaganda. I've got some strings of lights that were working last year when I put them away. She pulled them out and I got no lights working. Well, being an electrician I can fix this, or at least figure them out. Not so easy. I'm tracing the wires in the string. I've got neutrals jumpering, hots jumpering. How in the world are these things put together? Does Scott have a schematic for Christmas lights?

My solution is.....replacement time! Matter of fact, quite a few big box stores are buying 'old' lights via a credit toward buying new LED light strings.

My wife does this exercise times 100. They have a storage bay full of Christmas decorations at the country club and around the community.
Her policy is to just chuck those little lights because there are several, incompatible, types of bulbs, it can easily take an hour to find the bad socket and they cost about $2.
If you do want to fix these, expect to find a socket that is not working because the little wire on the bulb is not touching the contact. They are usually shunted if they are just burned out. That tool they sell basically just cuts through the insulation and shorts out the bulb socket one at a time. It works if you only have one bad.

Yes, I have 'invested' a few hours into attempting to fix something that is 'simple'. Afterwards, I came to the conclusion to use the round cylinderical container, and make a trip to the store.

There also could be a possibility of creating a hazzard.

Those LED indoor/outdoor strings sure look enticing, even though they are about 3-times the cost of the cheapo $4.00 incandescent 100-bulb strings. I guess if they actually last as long as they say, after a few years of futzing around and tossing the incandescent strings, they may actually be less expensive.
It would imagine the energy savings could really add up too, if you happen to decorate your house with lights like the Griswolds.

Kjay:

Back 2-3 years ago, I came upon some LED icicle strings, after Christmas, for 75% off. I wish I grabbed a few more! I'm getting 6 new LED strings next week & trading in the old sets.

How are the LEDs connected? If this is still the same cheapo socket they can fail the same way.

LED are pemanent. You can not remove the LED from the string. I hope yours last longer then mine. After two years half the LEDs were out. Would have been better off buying the old style with bulbs.

Greg:

LEDs are not removable. They appear to be wired like regular bulbs, in the grand style of.......China.

I have C9 and C7 strings all with replacement LED lamps

I fix every set of my lights that I own, I have thousands of lights, it becomes a talent to fox them, I refuse to throw any out, I do actually find it worth the time to fix them, especially when im getting them for free constantly.

If you guys are still using mains sets of lights, one of the handiest tools you can have is one of them Volt-Sticks, used for ball-park fault-finding/voltage detection.
A break in the wire is easily found.

Speaking of Xmas lights installs, I'm going to make a point of getting a picture of an elderly couples house from a little town called Chertsey, north of here.
The guy is like 75, his wife is 81 and to be honest, I don't know how he finds the energy to put all them lights up.
He re-invents his install every year.
It is a sight to behold, I'll keep you posted.

To tell the truth, I hate Christmas lights. They are the dumbest things I have every seen. I liked the old style where even if a light bulb burned out, the string would work. The new LED Christmas lights look promising though, and I can't wait to try them out and see how they work.

Some strings were wired in series. Some were wired in parallel at line voltage. This is because it was possible to make bulbs at just about any voltage from 0.5 to 500. The lower voltage tends to be more reliable.

LEDs, however, are not so easily done. There is only small range they can make the voltage drop (they are a fixed voltage drop and need a ballast to prevent a cascade current much like fluorescent). There is a limit to wiring them in series. And wiring them in parallel requires a ballast on each bulb since the power source had to provide current for all. So these are often made in groups where it is series within the group, and the groups are in parallel on the string. This can lead to extra wires along the string. if the string has 3 or 4 conductors going along, this is probably what it is.

I may try LED strings this year (and maybe tear one down to see how poorly it is made).

Sadly, I do not have any Schematics for Christmas Lighting Strings available.

A few Schematics for Series-connected Christmas Lighting strings, would be a nice addition to the Tech. Reference area.

I wonder if a Non-Contact Voltage Tester may be used successfully, to locate failed or loose Lamps within a given Series Loop?

-- Scott

Hit "Submit" too soon!
Wanted to mention Outdoor LED Arrays:

One of our Neighbors setup their Outdoor Christmas Lights a few days ago. They purchased several new LED Animated and Non-Animated Arrays, which (to me) are very impressive...

The Strings look like the older 120V B10 Candelabra Base Outdoor Lamp types, but instead of the Lamps being Incandescent, the "Filament" is comprised of LEDs (LEDs inside of the B10 Lamp "Shell").

The Non-Animated Strings (static, no change in color, no flashing or chasing, etc.) have LEDs with Pastel Colored Light output. The Light emitted from the Lamp assembly is not Monochromatic at all! In fact, the output is more like a filtered Incandescent "Color Corrected Lamp", with the Intensity of an LED.

The Animated Strings have, IIRC, 7 Color LED Arrays in each "Lamp" - with these Colors:

- Red,
- Orange,
- Yellow,
- Green,
- Cyan,
- Blue,
- White.

Nice to see Polychromatic LED Light Output - and "Soft Filtered" too!

Just my 2¢

-- Scott

Scott:

Trumpy seems to think so!
"I wonder if a Non-Contact Voltage Tester may be used successfully, to locate failed or loose Lamps within a given Series Loop?"

Thanks for the LED details.

The LEDs I have are 'after Christmas' bargain iccicle, multi color. That's all I know.

In regards to "Hotline1" (John) reply above:



Which is in reference to:



In the words of Homer Simpson, one thing can - and should be said...

"D'ohh!!!

What a Bonehead I am!!!
When I read Mike's (Trumpy) Post, for some reason I was thinking "Ball-Park" as an actual Stadium-like Ball Park; instead of "Approximate"!


Man, that's funny!... Classic example of lack of

Pardon the Confusion...

-- Scott

I helped my uncle setup his LEDs that he used last year. By the 4th set, I was already putting a pile of stuff to fix. And the design is very flawed, as a good portion of the sets were coated in rust from the LED contacts/leads, they are NOT meant to last long from what i'm seeing...