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24 May 07
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Homemade Dimmer
This past year we bought a very cheap string with a "snowball" diffusing coating that started blowing 4 or 5 bulbs a week. Even our usual full replacement string would have been consumed in 5 or 6 months. Eventually, I took the plug and socket from a replacement string, and put a silicon power diode in the circuit. Any diode over, say, 200V (peak-inverse-voltage) and 1A current should work (and if it fails, the lights just go back to full brightness). The diode can be oriented in either direction and placed in either line. In my versions, clear heat-shrink tubing covers the connections and the diode itself.
The diode puts the string at half intensity, and we now lose about a bulb a month. I did the same thing with other strings, with similar results. Somewhat surprisingly, in no case was the dimmer light a problem.
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19 Dec 06
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18 Dec 06
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