Good quality LED solar lights for tree?

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geekIT

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# 205791 27-Nov-2016 12:48

I want to string up some solar-powered lights (200-300) in a back-yard tree.

The last time I tried it, the solar power source fell over after 6-8 weeks.

Any recommendations for brand\source etc?

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richms

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# 1678233 27-Nov-2016 13:01

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I bought some kmart ones that have been sitting outside waiting me to put in for about a year, and the bundle of them is still lit up for a few hours each evening.

The LEDs seem to rust out on them before the solar fails. Avoid ones that look like they have poured resin over the solar panel, that crap goes chalky in no time and really lowers the charge they can get.

Richard rich.ms

geekIT

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# 1678365 27-Nov-2016 16:06

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Ok.

Well, we don't have a K-Mart here in deepest, darkest Southland. Not even a little old Bunnings (nearest is Dunedin) but we do have M10.

But all their LED stuff is very Chinese.

Yeah, I know just about everything on the NZ market is made there now, but on a scale of 1 to 10, most of the gear we're expected to buy would struggle to rate #3, IMHO.

And galvanized stuff - gawd, it's hopeless. We're around 50k from the sea but just about every galvanized item I've bought from M10 starts to rust within 6 months.

Any fool can make money, but it takes a very special person to earn the respect of respectable people.

richms

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# 1678369 27-Nov-2016 16:08

Bit late to be hitting up aliexpress if you want them on the tree this year. I have a few crap sets that I have just binned the solar box and feed them thru a resistor from 5v from a powerbank when I want them to be lit up. You can put way more current into them than the solar box does since its trying to run it for hours on a single AA cell.

Watch out for the newest sets if you want to do that tho, they have the 2 colours hooked up in reverse to each other so they can animate, and on DC only one lot will light.

Richard rich.ms

tieke

312 posts

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# 1678393 27-Nov-2016 16:40

Don't know how good they are but the Warehouse have some on sale at the moment - white and coloured 400-LED strings for $35, and shaped ones for $20, although it looks like you need to get those in-store.

geekIT

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# 1678433 27-Nov-2016 17:50

Thanks, Tieke, the white ones look OK.

Cheers :-)

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Handle9

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# 1678437 27-Nov-2016 18:01

@richms. What sort of batteries do these things have? I tried replacing some with Nigh but they just seemed to run for 4 days then stop working.

richms

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# 1678438 27-Nov-2016 18:06

All mine have had really low capacity nicad cells in them, except for some motion sensor ones which have a small lithium pack.

Richard rich.ms

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# 1678484 27-Nov-2016 20:07

Stupid autocorrect - I wrote NiMh. Might try a replacement Nicad. Annoying that the aren't totally interchangeable with the crappy charging circuits in these things.

eracode

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# 1678596 28-Nov-2016 03:30

Have a word to Mayor Tim - he knows all about Chinese Christmas lights, eh.