- Written By: Bryan Pedersen
- Edited By: Lindsay D.
- Last Modified Date: 23 December 2011
-
Copyright Protected:
2003-2012 Conjecture Corporation
Stringing up Christmas lights has traditionally been one of the most tortuous of holiday tasks. Untangling wires, balancing on a ladder and attaching them to the house are all chores associated with this endeavor, but the biggest problem for many people is finding that mysterious broken bulb. Hours are lost and tempers flare, but this is where LED Christmas lights can show their true benefit.
LED Christmas lights use light emitting diodes rather than the traditional miniature incandescent bulbs. LEDs are much like incandescent bulbs except that they do not have a filament inside that can burn out and take the entire string of bulbs with it. Instead, they are illuminated by the movement of electrons in a semi-conductor material. Another benefit of this light source is the absence of excessive heat and wasted electricity.
LEDs have been around for a long time, but only caught on for use as Christmas lights in recent years. One reason is that older LEDs originally came in only red. Incandescent bulbs, on the other hand, emit only white light but are encased in colored glass. Another problem was a lack of brightness of LEDs. The potential was there however, and advanced LEDs solved these problems. Today you can find LED christmas lights in all kinds of shapes and sizes. They can blink just like the regular incandescent varieties and come in a wide range of colors.
The end result is a string of lights that use about one-tenth of the electrical current of the more commonly used incandescent lights. They are also encased in thick plastic rather than flimsy glass, so broken bulbs and mistakenly stepping on one won't result in a holiday tragedy. As mentioned, the life of LEDs are extremely long-they are used often in the dashboards of jet planes-so burn out after one season is highly unlikely. One last benefit is the relative thickness of the wires used for these lights, making wires less likely to get tangled in the closet or garage.
Caring for LED lights is simple with such a long life and tough casing. Users can simply roll them up and store them at the end of the holiday and fully expect to come back next year and find them still functioning.
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anon236429
Post 36 |
Having used LED light strings for a few years, I'm seeing pretty short life spans. By the flicker, it's obvious that they are running on one half of the AC cycle. I'll bet that the LEDs are seeing a high reverse leakage voltage that is blowing them out. I'm tempted to throw together a rectifier-filter to feed the lights with DC. |
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anon233292
Post 35 |
Re post 34: I meant to say the timers leak electricity even when shut off and it doesn't take much electricity to light an LED hence the strands glow a little. Our LED lights only turn completely off when unplugged. |
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anon233074
Post 34 |
I wrote post 32. An electrical engineer told my husband that all strands leak a little bit of electricity even when shut off. And it doesn't take much to light an LED, hence the faint glow. |
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anon232854
Post 33 |
So many questions, not nearly enough answers. I'm still wondering about the faint glow of lights on some of my outdoor strands that are strung together. I've never seen lights that only faintly glow. Usually, they either work or they don't. I have several strands all working fine, then there are about three strands that have the glow. We've had some drizzle today, so I'm not sure if that is the problem, although these are indoor/outdoor use. I've never used LEDs for Christmas lights before, so I don't know what the faint glow means. Help please! |
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anon232461
Post 32 |
We are having the same problem as described in Post 20 above by anon130084. We have three strands of LED lights strung together. They were plugged into a timer. Two of the strands turned off at the time we set on the timer. But the strand in the middle keeps a faint glow through the night. It will only turn off completely when unplugged. We tried another timer same thing. Then we plugged into a power strip. When we switched it off, the same strand in the middle kept a faint glow. It turns off completely only when unplugged. Does anyone know why? Do we need to change the fuse in the strand? |
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anon141450
Post 29 |
I have to say, the LEDs are really ugly! That glare, especially from the blue ones, and the weird metallic look resemble something from a funhouse, not Christmas! I know there are top-quality bulbs out there for LED sets, but they cost $1.49 per bulb! I hope the incandescents will stay. They are warm, they glow, and they are pleasant to the eye. |
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anon138584
Post 28 |
Three out of 8 strings of fairly-spendy outdoor LED lights have died, after only a month running on a timer. These do not seem to be a good investment. |
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anon138355
Post 27 |
This is my second year buying outdoor c-9 led Christmas lights. The first year I purchased GE brand, they got water inside the cover and when it froze the light covers popped off. I returned them to Costco for a refund. This year I bought holiday brand. The covers stayed on but they still got water in them and several strings stopped working. I will never buy outdoor led lights again. --TBOly |
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anon134998
Post 26 |
I have new twinkling led icecycle lights this year. one strand has blown it's fuse twice. There are no strands plugged into it that would add extra load to it. Any ideas? |
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anon134731
Post 25 |
After having found my strand of second season LED Christmas lights to be dead this year I am thoroughly disgusted. I was hoping the hype about them being long lasting was true but given that they're made in China I guess I was gullible. No more Chinese lights for me. From now on it's the old style larger bulb sized strands. |
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anon134387
Post 24 |
I installed a .75 kva transformer from 480 to 120 volt and a gfci on a 3 phase service to power outdoor christmas lighting. I have about 130 volts. The old style lights work on this outlet but the led lights don't. If I plug the led lights in an outlet in the garage they come on. Can you tell me what might be wrong and how to fix it? |
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anon134267
Post 23 |
I've gotten several sets of LED lights that I use indoors. By the time I take them down, after 4-5 weeks of use, I find several lights on every strand that are burned out. The claim of long lifetime (which makes sense, given LEDs) is just not true for Christmas lights. |
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anon133459
Post 22 |
I finally got my LED icicles out today and put them up. I bought them last year and have five strings running together, for a total of approx 45 feet. They were stored after New Years and now, after putting them up (thinking I wouldn't have to check the "reliable" LEDs), I've found that string #4 has half the string unlit. I understand that the person answering these questions feels it must be environmental and not a problem with the line itself, but, considering they were used about four to six weeks last winter, stored and then brought out again, I'm more inclined to believe the problem is the line/light. I'm more than a bit peeved, especially since I'll likely have to go out and spend money on another set (after what I considered an investment) and I'll have to try to get the darn thing replaced, even knowing that for the next week, at least, the temps are supposed to stay below freezing. While bright, the LEDs have a much smaller circle of light than the older bulbs. My old lights looked like icicles while these look like a random, misty pouf of bluish light. I lost a bit of the effect of the icicles just so I wouldn't have to replace the lines or bulbs and - voila - Titanic! Don't say it won't happen because it will! |
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anon130371
Post 21 |
If you have any movable or musical ornaments, they do not work on LED lights - these lights apparently aren't strong enough. I'm taking mine back to the store. My movable ornaments are important to my family. |
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anon130084
Post 20 |
Ok here is a goofy one. I have my LED christmas lights in the yard all plugged into a timer. When the timer goes off at night, there will a few bulbs throughout the yard that stay on. Not all on the same string. There does not seem to be any pattern to the ones that are on staying on. I noticed it last night and changed to a different timer today and again the same thing tonight. Most of the lights are completely off, but like i said, a few bulbs here and there stay on. They are not burning bright but strong enough to see that they are still on. What is causing this? Is it another bad timer? |
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bryamann
Post 19 |
How does the luxor lumens of LED compare to incandescent lights? I usually use 3,000 small lights on my Christmas tree. I am thinking of converting to LED exclusively and trying to determine how many I need for the same "brightness" and to avoid blinding myself. |
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anon126310
Post 17 |
Five out of six of my LED Christmas lights are half dead after being used for one year and carefully stored! These things cost money compared to the cheap incandescents so I am not happy. It appears from what I can find that there is no fix. One socket could have rusted and half of the light will die. I did not purchase these to be disposable. Bad product. |
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anon96757
Post 16 |
I also have a string, less than a year old. The last half won’t come on. One bulb is bad, the others test Ok. Replacement bulbs that came with the string, don’t light in that socket. The bad bulb doesn’t fit in other sockets, which makes me think it's special. The higher cost does not make them cost effective. |
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anon56224
Post 15 |
How do you stop LED's from blinking? |
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radzik
Post 14 |
I just tried plugging in some regular lights to a couple strings of LED lights and they stopped working. Is there anything I can do to fix them? |
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anon55197
Post 12 |
i have been using the old school c7 lights for the last few years. i can't stand them because you can only run two strands in a series, but my wife loves them because she says they can be seen better than the little lights. I have been wanting to switch to led lights, but was wondering how many strings you can run in a series without blowing a fuse. i need a total of 175-200 feet. Can this be done on one outlet? |
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anon54349
Post 11 |
I have two strings of LED lights that are each 15 feet long. I need exactly 22 feet of lights, so can I cut and splice these two sets together to make exactly 22 feet? |
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anon48485
Post 10 |
Here are some answers :) 9. No, the bulbs are not interchangeable - on most LED sets, the LED's are permanently mounted in their housings and you can't replace them. 8. No, the old style sets pull so many more amps that you'd probably fry your LED set. 7. The connections in rope lights can be broken if you try to wrap them in too small of a circle. Try splicing a new section in and covering the splice with heat shrink. The sets might also be damaged due to exposure to salt water. 4. You might have experienced a power surge or you've had damage to your electrical wiring. Remember, LEDs are solid state devices - plug them into a surge protectors. Also, they could have been the victim of environmental degradation. The LED are really durable but the wiring is still susceptible to UV degradation. Like all manufactured devices, there is going to be a failure rate - if the lights failed within the first week, more than likely it was a manufacturing issue - otherwise more than likely environmental. That's why on all kinds of Christmas lighting a pretty standard warranty is 90 days. 2. LED sets are wired in series. Other answer depends on the sets. :) |
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anon22914
Post 9 |
Are the tiny LED Christmas light bulbs interchangeable with the small lights on the old type strings? |
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sandjar
Post 8 |
Can I plug in a strand of older regular outdoor lights to the new LED stand of lights? |
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anon19909
Post 7 |
I have various LED rope lights and often enough they stop working at various lengths and on different strings. This is being used for holiday deco on a navy ship and tends to be an issue. The lights are either strung up using wire cable or rope to keep it from shifting, zip-tied and such. why do they stop working at various spots ??? |
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nashbaar
Post 6 |
There are two main types of LED's stringers in the market today. There are Half Wave and Full Wave rectified, at the easiest level the Full wave do not have any flicker to them where as some of the 1/2 wave do. That is not to say that 1/2 wave is bad, I sell a ton of 1/2 wave product!
To answer the other questions on here:
Regarding them not working: when you purchase LED's you are making an investment, choose a brand that has a warranty on them (most big box stores do not)
For any Christmas decor/lights I would not store them outside, the suns UV rays will eat at the cords.
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anon6522
Post 5 |
can I store my christmas tree with led lights outside?
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jakester
Post 4 |
This is a question about LED christmas lights. I have 3 strings and am having problems with all of them. I thought they were long lasting. One string, half stopped working, another icicle string, again 1/2 stop working and now another string is completely dead. Does anyone know why? |
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anon5799
Post 3 |
The above two questions were just what I wanted to know. Please answer them! |
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mikerauh
Post 2 |
1. Are the LEDs wired in series or in parallel?
2. Does the string of lights run directly on 110V AC line voltage, or is there a step-down to low-voltage DC? |
