LED Christmas Light Technology & Data Questions
How many LED's are in your lights?We use one high quality (super bright) LED per bulb for each LED Christmas Lights. Both the LED and lens are colored.
What are the Lumens of an LED Christmas Lights?You can not directly convert since they measure different things. The most useful explanation is that lumens measure light output at the source, while candelas measure the light that falls on a surface. As the area of the surface increases, the number of candelas will decrease even as the number of lumens remains constant. To complicate this more here is the conversion. Find your LED Christmas Lights beam width in degrees, and divide the candelas number in your specs by the cd/lm factor listed for that beam angle to get lumens.
Are the LED Christmas Lights series or parallel connected?Our LED CHristmas lights are parallel connected. Here is a brief explanation of the difference.
In electronics, components of an electronic circuit can be connected in series or in parallel. Components connected in series are connected along a single path, so the same current flows through all of the components. Components connected in parallel are connected so the same voltage is applied to each component.
A circuit composed solely of components connected in series is known as a series circuit; likewise, one connected completely in parallel is known as a parallel circuit.
In a series circuit, the current through each of the components is the same, and the voltage across the components is the sum of the voltages across all the components. In a parallel circuit, the voltage across each of the components is the same, and the total current is the sum of the currents through all the components.
As an example, consider a very simple circuit consisting of four light bulbs and one 6 V battery. If a wire joins the battery to one bulb, to the next bulb, to the next bulb, to the next bulb, then back to the battery, in one continuous loop, the bulbs are said to be in series. If each bulb is wired to the battery in a separate loop, the bulbs are said to be in parallel. If the four light bulbs are connected in series, the same current flows through all of them, and the voltage drop is 1.5 V across each bulb. If the light bulbs are connected in parallel, the current flowing through the light bulbs combine to form the current flowing in the battery, while the voltage drop is 6 V across each bulb.
In a series circuit, every device must function for the circuit to be complete. One bulb burning out in a series circuit kills the circuit. In parallel circuits, each light has its own circuit, so all but one light could be burned out, and the last one will still function.
How does a Full-Wave LED Christmas lights work?A '''diode bridge''' or '''bridge rectifier''' is an arrangement of four diodes connected in a bridge circuit as shown below, that provides the same polarity of output voltage for any polarity of the input voltage. When used in its most common application, for conversion of alternating current (AC) input into direct current (DC) output, it is known as a bridge rectifier. The bridge rectifiers provide full wave rectification from a two wire AC input.
The essential feature of this arrangement is that for both polarities of the voltage at the bridge input, the polarity of the output is constant.
==Basic operation== When the input connected at the left corner of the diamond is positive with respect to one connected at the right hand corner, Current (electricity) flows to the right along the upper colored path to the output, and returns to the input supply via the lower one.
When the right hand corner is positive relative to the left hand corner, current flows along the upper colored path and returns to the supply via the lower colored path.
In each case, the upper right output remains positive with respect to the lower right one. Since this is true whether the input is AC DC, this circuit not only produces DC power when supplied with AC power: it also can provide what is sometimes called "reverse polarity protection". That is, it permits normal functioning when battery (electricity) batteries are installed backwards or supply wiring "has its wires crossed" (and protects the circuitry it powers against damage that might occur without this circuit in place).
Prior to availability of integrated electronics, such a bridge rectifier was always constructed from discrete components. Since about 1950, a single four-terminal component containing the four diodes connected in the bridge configuration became a standard commercial component and is now available with various voltage and current ratings.
AC half wave and full wave rectified signals
The gap in the half wave causes the flicker. The full wave takes the gap out of the power cycle making it flicker free and 40% brighter.
== Output smoothing == For many applications, especially with single phase AC where the full-wave bridge serves to convert an AC input into a DC output, the addition of a capacitor may be important because the bridge alone supplies an output voltage of fixed polarity but pulsating magnitude (see photograph above).
The function of this capacitor, known as a 'smoothing capacitor' (see also Filter capacitor) is to lessen the variation in (or 'smooth') the raw output voltage waveform from the bridge. One explanation of 'smoothing' is that the capacitor provides a low impedance path to the AC component of the output, reducing the AC voltage across, and AC current through, the resistive load. In less technical terms, any drop in the output voltage and current of the bridge tends to be cancelled by loss of charge in the capacitor. This charge flows out as additional current through the load. Thus the change of load current and voltage is reduced relative to what would occur without the capacitor. Increases of voltage correspondingly store excess charge in the capacitor, thus moderating the change in output voltage / current.
The capacitor and the load resistance have a typical time constant <math>\tau=RC</math> where ''C'' and ''R'' are the capacitance and load resistance respectively. As long as the load resistor is large enough so that this time constant is much longer than the time of one ripple cycle, the above configuration will produce a well smoothed DC voltage across the load resistance.
OK that is a bit to much information! Is there a simpler way to look at this?A half wave rectifier is a special case of a clipper (electronics). In half wave rectification, either the positive or negative half of the AC wave is passed easily while the other half is blocked, depending on the polarity of the rectifier. Because only one half of the input waveform reaches the output, it is very inefficient if used for power transfer. Half wave rectification can be achieved with a single diode in a one phase supply.
Full wave rectification converts both polarities of the input waveform to DC, and is more efficient. However, in a circuit with a non-center tapped transformer, four rectifiers are required instead of the one needed for half-wave rectification. This is due to each output polarity requiring 2 rectifiers each, for example, one for when AC terminal 'X' is positive and one for when AC terminal 'Y' is positive. The other DC output requires exactly the same, resulting in four individual junctions (See semiconductors/diode). Four rectifiers arranged this way are called a bridge rectifier:
What is a Rectifier?
A rectifier is an electrical device, which converts alternating current to direct current, a process known as rectification.
When just one diode is used to rectify AC (by blocking the negative or positive portion of the waveform) the difference between the term diode and the term rectifier is merely one of usage, e.g. the term rectifier describes a diode that is being used to convert AC to DC than is possible with just a single diode.
How many LED Christmas Lights can you string end to end?LED Christmas Lights Residential -the average wattage of our LED Christmas Light sets is 4.8 watts of power with a 125V - 3 amp fuses. The New rating for the UL Listing on LED light sets is 210 Watts. 44 sets end to end at 4.8 watts.
Commercial LED Christmas Lights sets are different in that the end to end connections have been changed to a two prong screw together system. This system stops any use of another product on the end and is fused at 5 amps. You can run 88 LED strings end to end with just one end cord.
Are the "Full Wave LED Christmas Lights strings okay for outdoor use?Yes use indoor or outdoor.
If you have any other questions that are not addressed here please contact us, we will be happy to answer your questions.