Seasonal, extremely naive, electrical/wiring question

[GB]

Yes, I hadn't realised how it coped with a couple of conked out bulbs, but that's been explained.

[Graham.]

The usual arrangement with series mains strings is that one bulb, usually clear uncoloured with a white tip has no bypass mechanism and, acts as a fuse if too many of the others fail and bypass themselves.

The problem is the user most likely does not recognise this safety feature and replaces it with one of the supplied coloured spares.

What I have always done with series strings, is to put a suitably rated diode in series with the live wire inside the plug, which dims them and makes them last for many more Christmases than they would otherwise, and also imparts a slight flicker which is quite attractive.

[ARW]

Speak for yourself.

I would have been delighted if my ex mother in law had touched a live cable.

[Robin]

I don't recall us having any in the early 60s.

[Another John]

Chaps: I am overwhelmed, and slightly damp-eyed, to find so many responses. Martin's responses in particular had the combination of accurate interpretation of my description, together with cool, close analysis of what I ought to do next!

... which is: cut the plug off and forget them! (given my lack of expertise in, and understanding of, electrics)

I would like to take a picture of this now-famous set of lights, and put it up on Tinypic -- I'll let you know when I do. From the sound of it some of you may be aghast.

I do like Malcolm's suggesti> Would it be possible to replace the wiring and bulb holders with an LED

Thanks a lot! John

[Max Demian]

Foil from a chocolate bar?

[Andrew Gabriel]

I saw a set fail before there were fuse lamps - was a bright flash from the set and the plug fuse blew. Investigating afterwards, it was found all the lamps blown and shorted. However, there were several cases a year where they didn't all fail so suddenly, and the remaining ones set light to the tree.

Back before LEDs when the old series strings were used for public displays where no one is going to be shinning up lamp posts to find the blown lamp, the trick normally used was to use some extra sacraficial sets to cut up and add about 10% extra series lamps to each working set, and that was enough to prevent lamps blowing during the displays.

[harry]

In days of yore, Christmas tree lights were wired in series eg 20 12 volt lights. So avoiding the need for a transformer. You can check this by removing one lamp & the whole lot will go out. If you reduce the number of lamps, the voltage across each lamp will be increased so reducing their life.

There are inherent dangers with this method, especially if there are kids about and the lights are old an neglected. Best to get shot of them & buy a low voltage set.

[Robin]

umm...err...I had to get up in the morning at ten o'clock at night half an hour before I went to bed, drink a cup of sulphuric acid, work twenty-nine hours a day down mill, ...

[Another John]

Dear all

OP here - I said I would attempt to upload pics of the infamous Christmas Lights that I described. Here are three:

Light-set

Plug (original, as attached when bought): A typical bulb (if you try and pull it out, it will disintegrate, as I found out): The holders are indeed metal, as someone enquired (the light-set chimes like little bells when swinging about), but don't worry! - Each bulb holder has a plastic ring insert, so that's alright :-)

We really don't know how old they are -- 25 years? 30? We never had a bulb go until last Christmas. Didn't do anything about it then because (as someone also commented) some sets were designed to stay lit if a bulb went.

As already stated: I am reluctantly scrapping it. If I can take up Malcolm's suggestion:

.. my wife will be thrilled!

Cheers John

** That's the last time I ever use tinypic -- it looks as dodgy as hell these days, and it's bloody awkward to use as well! What's more I don't like the look of any of the modern, slick alternatives ... gonna talk to John (the Original John).

[NY]

That's definitely series - one insulated wire (not a pair of wires) going from one light not the next and back to the plug.

I'm not sure how they continued to work if a couple of bulbs were not lit. They should have caused the whole set to fail as happened when you tried to remove one of the bulbs.

I use postimages.org which allows you to post a URL to the whole photo excluding borders and adverts:

[Andy Burns]

Wait until January and the supermarkets are practically giving away the unsold LED sets, take one of your lamps/holders with you to match size, look at bigclive's videos and lots of the "snowflake" or "icicle" design shades just pull off, probably warm white would suit them better then cold white ...

[Geo]

I bought a string from the pound shop last year just to get 20 white LEDs to repair some garden solar lights. Yes - they just pull out of the shades and are about 5mm diameter:-

[spuorgelgoog]

The equivalent from Maplin would have been ...

Owain

[Marland]

Some tinsel from the tree may be metallic and close to hand.

GH