Christmas lights

[vakkotaur]

When I was a kid the Christmas tree at home had a couple strings of large lights. Not huge, but certainly not the little mini or submini lights became common. I think these were the C7 size. As that's what I grew up with, that's what I tend to think of as the default "right" size for Christmas lights. The minis aren't bad, just not what I think of first.

I also recall seeing some rather large bulbs that my grandparents had. These were likely for outdoor display given the size. They also were fancy looking, with a neat twist or swirl to the glass. I don't recall ever seeing these lights used. I think I asked about them once and was told that the string was too old (and worn) to be trusted.

The city of Fairmont is also the electric utility provider and this year had (or has, for a few more days) a rebate program for Compact Fluorescent Lights. This was a really good deal and jmaynard and I took advantage of it to change almost every bulb in the house. When I last visited the City offices to pay the utility bill I saw they had another, more seasonal, rebate program. It would mean a few dollars off of the purchase of a new LED string of Christmas lights. We don't put up any lights for Christmas (we're always somewhere else anyway) so we didn't take advantage of this program.

I saw some of these LED Christmas lights and was a bit amused at a solution to an obvious LED problem. LEDs are very directional. That's great for things like flashlights, but lousy for things like decorative lights. The solution is to have the LED illuminate a plastic envelope (not solid plastic when only the shell is really needed) to disperse the light. Further, the envelope is faceted to further disperse the light. The result is a large (about C7 sized) fancy looking envelope.

Most LED lights that are meant to replace incandescent lights are too dim, and are generally too directional. So far the biggest change has just been flashlights. But the LED light strings make a lot of sense. LEDs are now bright enough to work in that application if not for general illumination. They run cool, so lighting based fire hazard is reduced, and of course they also use less energy than incandescent lights. And they are truly solid state, so they are going to last long time. That to make them workable means a fancy-looking plastic envelope of about C7 size certainly doesn't hurt, at least in my opinion.

Comments

[yakko.livejournal.com]

I've been using LED strings of mini lights for a couple years now. They seem to be simple strings directly powered by the AC line, though this new string I bought has heat-shrunk devices inserted every few bulbs. They seem to work better than the old strings.