"Short Wave Sportfishing" wrote in message
news
On Sun, 19 Nov 2006 13:09:48 GMT, "Jim" wrote:


"Short Wave Sportfishing" wrote in message
. ..
On Sun, 19 Nov 2006 08:25:01 GMT, James Sweet
wrote:



Inverters are rated in watts.

Less than two watts for 100 mini lights.

I ran two six foot Christmas trees, about 5 100 light mini string and
four light strings off a 350 watt inverter at last years Festival of
Lights in Putnam and it didn't even breathe hard.

Have a freakin' ball with the lights. :)

Try closer to 50W for a string of 100 mini lights, unless they're the
LED type.

No way. And just to prove a point, I went out to the garage and
looked on a box of colored mini lights - 150 string.

2.4 watts.

I was a little surprised honestly, but last year I acquired a
power analyzer and ran around plugging in everything I could find in the
house. The Christmas tree with miniature lights on it was pulling around
350W, at which point I started checking individual strings. Incandescent
loads have a unity power factor, so you can measure the amp draw with
any cheap multimeter and use ohms law to calculate the watts.

Interesting - that string I ran on my truck drew less than 200 watts
total.

NO WAY
2.4W............................................ .................................................. .....
................................................ .................................................. ...........................
................................................ .................................................. ...........................

I just checked a set of icicle lights.
Individual lights =2.5V
Total of 100 lights
Fuse = 3A
No where on the package could I find watts or amps rating.
Measured draw = 300MA or 36 W

Crap - well, don't I look stupid. :)

I took the power analyzer out and took a look - works out to 40.3
watts per 100 mini's.

You're right.

Upon reading the box, the only way I can think of that I came up with
that is that I read it wrong - it's small print, I took off my glasses
to read it. It's 2.5 volts per bulb.

My bad.

I APOLOGISE A THOUSAND TIMES!! I MADE A MISTAKE!!!!

I'M ONLY HUMAN!!! :)

Oh, and the inverter in my truck is 1k watts, not 350.

D'Oh!!!
No need to grovel. Just send one of those el cheapo blanks you are trying to
give away, with some of your winding handiwork and instructions on how to
use the darn thing. What sort of instrument are you using to get such a
precise reading?
Jim (smiley)