Hi Allen,
Quiet crowd, eh? They must all be shopping. I'll hop in. I can see
why you'd like the old incandescent colored lights. They do have a
certain unique charm to them. Having said that, though, my family has
never bought any of those since the mini incandescents came out due to
the fire hazard of the larger lights. I think someone in our extended
family or maybe an acquaintance had a Christmas light induced fire
once. Those events are NOT pretty. I think that's the reason that
everyone's moving away from them, more so than just energy savings.
Up to this point, I've never really bought the new LED lights either.
I've seen some on other people's trees. They generally look pretty. I
think your comment about them being too bright at certain angles is a
matter of the industry learning more about how to do the optics design
and how hard to drive the lights. I've seen little blue lights on car
chargers, etc. that would almost blind you at night.
Interesting what you said about flicker. I cannot see flicker at 60 hz,
and most people cannot. Some are more sensitive to the flicker if it's
off to the side. But, the fact that you mentioned it at all is
curious. An LED is a dc device. So, are they running the lights
through a power supply or are they running them directly off the ac
line? You could run a string 100 LED's directly off the AC line if
they're in series and they'd only light up on one half cycle. But, then
they're subject to the old one light fails and they all fail concept.
So, it would be interesting to know how these things work.
By the way, you said you're accumulating 60 W incandescent bulbs. You
should try the new Cree LED 60 W replacements at Home Depot. I've got a
couple and I REALLY like them. The only problem is the $ 13 ea price
tag. Nevertheless, when the CFL's in the house burn out, I'm probably
putting LED's in their place.
Sincerely,
Ron
On 12/10/2013 2:39 PM, Allen Beddingfield wrote:
This seems like a good topic for this time of year, and is sort of
tech-ish. Over the last few years, we have been bombarded with LED
Christmas lights. They started out as the little icicle lights, and
now they seem to be the main thing sold in strands for Christmas trees
and house decorating. I've noticed this year that there are an
increasing number of them even in the big C7 and C9 sizes, and that
the selection of mini through C9 is pushed off to the side.
Am I the only one who hates the "too bright" look of these, and the
flicker? it seems to me they flicker about as bad as an old CRT
monitor at 60hz. Some of the LEDs are actually piercing and painful
if you happen to stare at them at just the right angle.
I never was even a fan of the mini lights. I've always preferred to
use incandescent C9 around the house and on outdoor bushes, with
incandescent C7 on the tree indoors. Anyone else particularly annoyed
by the LEDs and prefer the old-style lights - especially the C7 and C9
bulbs? We are already being forced to save energy all year long,
can't they leave the 3-4 weeks around Christmas alone?! lol
Right now, I'm taking the same approach with these that I am with
incandescent 60 watt light bulbs - buying up a lot of them.
Allen B.
--
Allen Beddingfield
[email protected]
--
(PS - If you email me and don't get a quick response, you might want to
call on the phone. I get about 300 emails per day from alternate energy
mailing lists and such. I don't always see new email messages very quickly.)
Ron Frazier
770-205-9422 (O) Leave a message.
linuxdude AT techstarship.com
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