So, you accidentally stick a regular clear bulb in your Christmas lights (fairy lights [US] ?) instead of a fuse bulb. Next time there's a bit of a surge, there's no discernable weak point in your circuit and it takes out more than one bulb. Where do you start debugging that?
Sure, you could sit with a multimeter and probe all the bulbs to find the duff ones. Have you ever tried to attach multimeter probes to a fairy light bulb?!?! It's a nightmare. Specially when you only have 8 fingers and two thumbs.
My bulbs have these little skimpy connectors and I think they're enamelled, so you'd be really lucky to get a closed circuit even with a good bulb.
Knickers to that. Chop one of the bulb holders out of the set and attach it onto a pair of 4mm banana plugs. Test all 40 bulbs in about 2 minutes. Patch the bulbholder back in. As it happens, 11 of them were blown (not bad!) and I only had 5 spares. So the whole set went into file #13 (the garbage).
I was trying to disambiguate for my American cousins across the pond. The strings of Christmas lights which come out once a year for those who celebrate Christmas.
Re-use? I keep trying to think of another use to put a string of Christmas lights to, or the wire. Ready made sockets, and I believe the bulbs pull out of the bases if the wires are straightened. Possibly insert LEDs, and run a group string on a different voltage?
Me too. Trouble is that to be under MCU control it would probably need to be low voltage. These bulbs can run 140mA at 2.5V if you have a 100 light set. If 10 of them are on at the same time, that’s 1.4 amps. That’s gonna need a heck of a sized PSU.
I have a couple of LED chains running of a 2x AA cells. They weren’t terribly expensive, either.
Sure, you could sit with a multimeter and delving all the bulbs to acquisition the duff ones. Accept you anytime approved to attach multimeter probes to a bogie ablaze bulb?!?! It’s a nightmare. Specially if you alone accept 8 fingers and two thumbs.
