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Re: [Shop-talk] xmas lights, shunts, and magic

To: Shop Talk 'shop-talk' <shop-talk@autox.team.net>
Subject: Re: [Shop-talk] xmas lights, shunts, and magic
From: Brian Kennedy <kennedybc@comcast.net>
Date: Sun, 5 Dec 2010 19:43:17 -0800
A long story, but I bought LED outdoor lights to replace my aging strings.
Shoulda looked at the colors. Is purple now a Xmas color? They use crinkley
bulbs, I'm guessing to make up for less brightness? In any event, I repaired
the old strings. They are parallel, so I just remove a socket when needed due
to squirrel damage and they work fine. Replaced a few bulbs. Bought a good
stock of spares for the future and am returning the LED string.

Brian C Kennedy

On Dec 5, 2010, at 1:36 PM, David Scheidt wrote:

> On Sun, Dec 5, 2010 at 3:37 PM, David C. <cavanadd@frontier.com> wrote:
>> Ok, I'll be the first to admit that I'm not up on Christmas lights and
>> decorations. B My primary response to the holidays, and Christmas in
>> particular, is to ignore them/it to the fullest extent possible. B I
> haven't
>> bought Christmas lights in probably 25 years. B Given that, I was under
the
>> impression that:
>> 1. B Pretty much all Christmas lights these days are LED; and
>> 2. B Series wired Christmas lights went out sometime around the middle of
> the
>> first Eisenhower administration. B Shunts? Seems like a solution looking
> for
>> a problem.
>
> Heh.  All LED lights are series wired.  (Someone, somewhere, probably
> makes a very, very expensive set where that's not true.  But it's true
> of anything you're going to get at a mass market store.)  They've got
> between 20 and 40 diodes wired in series,  plus a current limiting
> resistor.  If there are more bulbs than that, it's because there are
> two (or more) strands wired in parallel. Some of the nicer ones
> apparently have a reverse voltage  diode, but none of the ones I've
> taken apart have had one.  They've got shunts, too.  not because LEDs
> burn out, but because they get stepped on or hit with hammers.
>
>
> --
> David Scheidt
> dmscheidt@gmail.com
> __
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