Remote Living > Lighting

1/2 off Christmas lights

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dnix71:
I bought a string of 50 C6 warm white microchip holiday lights from Walgreens yesterday for $5. The set came with 2 spare LED's and a spare 3 amp/120 volt micro glass fuse. There are 2 fuses in the plug, one on each wire. There is no resistor, apparently, the string is two halves in series. Pull out one bulb and half shuts off.
The led's can be removed by hand. The bulb base has a plastic latch. The led is simply inserted in the base and the leads bent over.
The whole string uses 4.8 watts according to the box, but only 1 watt according to my Kill-A-Watt meter. The string has a visible flicker.
If you short a bulb across a 9 volt battery it blows immediately, but my nicad battery charger puts out 6.6 volts open circuit and that was low enough not to blow the led. At that voltage they are so bright that looking at one will leave spots in your eyes.
The official rating is 3.7 volts, but the current requirements are so low that the bulb will light if you touch one end to a 9 volt battery and use your body for the return.

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