Solar problem on a small scale

[Monzadude]

I have a few solar garden lights. Their just cheap ones. They've been working fine until last night. One of them started blinking. It's totally random. There seems to be a good charge and the LED bulb is still fine. There's nothing for the light to reflect off and cause a false reading for the light sensor. I covered the sensor with my hand and it still turned on and off. Sure I could just buy a new one but where's the fun in that. Does anyone have any ideas? This is a lot more fun than climbing on the roof to fix a problem with the big panels. Could you imagine the hole house blinking on and off at random? LOL My wife would kill me!

Bill

[wooferhound]

There could be a circuit in there that turns the light off when the battery gets below a certain voltage. It turns off and without a load the battery voltage climbs back up turning it back on, aand the cycle continues.

Sounds like old batteries to me . . .

[drdongle]

The solar cells in these lights are also really cheep so the cell in that unit may have degraded to a point where the battery is not fully charged producing a cycling effect.