Solar powerd LED lights

Martino

Martino

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It's stupid question time again, because I apparently don't understand LEDs!

I bought, on special today, a set of Phillips solar powered warm LEDs, meant for out door Christmas trees. 50 lights on the chain.

They appear to be wired in series, in that each LED gets two wires, and then two wires go on to the next LED.

I'd like to use these to illuminate buildings, street lights and signals on the railway. That's the theory if they charge up ok and keep working.

I assume I can extend the run between individual LEDs by splicing in lengths of similar wire?

I'm also assuming that LEDs have to be the correct way round, so I have to ensure that I keep the polarity constant?

Are both these assumptions correct?

Anything else I should be aware of?

I'd be grateful for help as I'm an idiot when it comes to LEDs!
 
Done this myself, so the answer is Yes and Yes to both questions.

I also wired up the lights to a Power Supply Unit and set the output power to the same as the battery output, don't have to worry about the batteries then.
 
I use them to make street light and light buildings. I have also hooked most of mine up to a Malibu garden timed transformer. There is a proper way of ascertaining the correct resistor to use (?) But like you I don't understand it . So I use any resistor that will still give me light when it hooks up to a 12vlt battery (For testing)
One other thing , I usually take the LED's off of the string and either use them as individuals or in shorter strings.
Buy them at this time of year from Wilkinsons and QD and I have a cheap supply for a year .
 
Martino said:
They appear to be wired in series, in that each LED gets two wires, and then two wires go on to the next LED.
Click to expand...

Whilst it's only a technical point and has little bearing on what you are doing, they are actually wired in Parallel if there are two wires going from lamp to lamp, and Series if there is only one wire. In parallel if one lamp fails then the string will keep working, in series they will all go out. There can be other complications but they aren't necessary to understand that principal.

Edit Sp!
 
The only thing to remember when splicing in more wire to lengthen a run is that the extra wire and the connections may add a resistance of their own and may dim the overall brightness depending on length, number of connections etc etc.
I have mixed leds (with included resistor to allow up to 22v), with incandescent bulbs (also up to 20V) already in situ in buildings, on the same run and it all works hunky dory as long as polarity is followed for the leds. I use parallel wiring for the whole run (incandescent bulb and obviously the leds).
For power, cheaply found LGB 1 amp transformer controllers (in parallel groups for extra amps for the big runs) in weatherproof boxes switched from inside the house.
 
Thank you everyone.

That all looks very helpful, and Bob, as you can see - I have no idea what I'm doing!

Anyway, looks like there are real possibilities so I'll follow all your advice and play around.

Thanks again everyone

m
 
It's an easy trip-up, till you get your head round it.

(As is spelling "parallel"). The rule is - only one "R" but two paral "l"'s. :rolleyes:
 
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