Is it possible to make your own LED christmas lights?

[Thetech]

I was wondering if it is possible to make your own lead free led christmas lights?
I have no clue as to how to go about this but I figured someone out there has tried it already.
I'm also wondering if I would end up spending more money trying to make my own. Please note that I have no experience with a soldering iron, but I am willing to try since my main goal would be safe but lead free low power consumption LED lights.

 

[herm0016]

you can buy a string of 50 from home depot for about 6 bucks. 50 leds, the resistors and the connectors would probably cost you 20 or 30 bucks. plus where are you going to get the weather proof "faceted" lens things so that the led ends up with a wider dispersal angle so you can see them more than 20 degrees off axis?

 

[phisrow]

It would certainly be possible to make your own; but, unless you value your time at $0/hour or less and have access to bulk buying power for components, you have essentially no chance of beating the retail price of LED lights.

As for lead free, I'm not as sure. Given the rise of RoHS compliance in the past couple of years, you should be able to get lead free LEDs and lead free solder without much trouble. Whether or not LED light chains are currently RoHS compliant or not I don't know. Lead should be a fairly minimal risk unless you have small children chewing, or similar, on the lights.

 

[Thetech]

I never factor in the cost of my labor in a project, but from what I've just been told by you guys It would be exspensive nevertheless. The whole point of doing so is for saftey reasons, I'd like to replace all of my incandescent leaded christmas lights with lead free led ones but I have not yet found a place the sells them.

 

[MrDudeMan]

Originally posted by: Thetech
I never factor in the cost of my labor in a project, but from what I've just been told by you guys It would be exspensive nevertheless. The whole point of doing so is for saftey reasons, I'd like to replace all of my incandescent leaded christmas lights with lead free led ones but I have not yet found a place the sells them.

why are you concerned about the lights being leaded? are you afraid you are going to accidentally chew on one?

 

[PottedMeat]

Originally posted by: MrDudeMan

Originally posted by: Thetech
I never factor in the cost of my labor in a project, but from what I've just been told by you guys It would be exspensive nevertheless. The whole point of doing so is for saftey reasons, I'd like to replace all of my incandescent leaded christmas lights with lead free led ones but I have not yet found a place the sells them.

why are you concerned about the lights being leaded? are you afraid you are going to accidentally chew on one?

Yeah, theres not really any point to the lead free part - isnt RoHS meant for minimizing the amount of toxic substances in disposal?

Besides it's not like kids are going to put the things in their mouths hanging up high and outside.

Are you sure those incandescent lights are leaded anyway? Most of the connections are probably made with compression.

 

[Thetech]

Originally posted by: PottedMeat

Originally posted by: MrDudeMan

Originally posted by: Thetech
I never factor in the cost of my labor in a project, but from what I've just been told by you guys It would be exspensive nevertheless. The whole point of doing so is for saftey reasons, I'd like to replace all of my incandescent leaded christmas lights with lead free led ones but I have not yet found a place the sells them.

why are you concerned about the lights being leaded? are you afraid you are going to accidentally chew on one?

Yeah, theres not really any point to the lead free part - isnt RoHS meant for minimizing the amount of toxic substances in disposal?

Besides it's not like kids are going to put the things in their mouths hanging up high and outside.

Are you sure those incandescent lights are leaded anyway? Most of the connections are probably made with compression.

No I'm not going to chew on one, I'm looking into this for a friend of a friend(who has small children) The lights will be on a christmas tree. The leaded part on christmas lights is the cord or strand that the lights are connected to, this part is usually made out of PVC which has lead added to it to make it flame retardent. That's what I'm concerned about.

 

[pm]

But as someone pointed out, the concern with lead is groundwater contamination from disposal. Lead is not poisonous in small quantities ingested rarely, the problem is long term exposure. Even if a small child were to chew on the wire (where are the parents during this?), it would cause no long-term effects - at least I've never heard of anyone studying minimal isolated lead exposure in children. Based on my experience with my children, the lights are far less dangerous to children than eating or breaking a ornament in his/her hand, or worst of all, knocking the tree over onto themselves while trying to reach for an ornament higher up the tree.

We put a small fence around our tree every year... and likely will do so again this year for our 2 year old. Much easier than wiring together custom Christmas lights.

 

[dkozloski]

The PVC would have to be digested in order to separate the lead from the plastic. As far as I know PVC goes through the intestinal tract virtually unscathed. The dangers here are not even theoretical.

 

[MrDudeMan]

Originally posted by: Thetech

Originally posted by: PottedMeat

Originally posted by: MrDudeMan

Originally posted by: Thetech
I never factor in the cost of my labor in a project, but from what I've just been told by you guys It would be exspensive nevertheless. The whole point of doing so is for saftey reasons, I'd like to replace all of my incandescent leaded christmas lights with lead free led ones but I have not yet found a place the sells them.

why are you concerned about the lights being leaded? are you afraid you are going to accidentally chew on one?

Yeah, theres not really any point to the lead free part - isnt RoHS meant for minimizing the amount of toxic substances in disposal?

Besides it's not like kids are going to put the things in their mouths hanging up high and outside.

Are you sure those incandescent lights are leaded anyway? Most of the connections are probably made with compression.

No I'm not going to chew on one, I'm looking into this for a friend of a friend(who has small children) The lights will be on a christmas tree. The leaded part on christmas lights is the cord or strand that the lights are connected to, this part is usually made out of PVC which has lead added to it to make it flame retardent. That's what I'm concerned about.

i didnt mean for that comment to sound nearly as sarcastic as it did. sorry about that. i was just curious why you were concerned since ive never really thought of the lead as being a problem. granted, my experience with kids has been limited until recently (sisters have 2 year olds), so there is a lot of stuff i dont think of yet.

 

[Thetech]

No problem MrDudeMan, I'm baseing what I said about the lead separating from the PVC on info I read online. I typically avoid buying products that contain exsposed lead as a habit of letting my money talk. I personally feel it should be phased out in most products, if over any concern over disposal. Would it be possible to coat the strand so they would be sealed?

 

[Jeff7]

E-mail these people and ask if these light strings are RoHS compliant

 

[MrDudeMan]

Originally posted by: Jeff7
E-mail these people and ask if these light strings are RoHS compliant

something i thought id throw out here...

a component or item in compliance with RoHS is not free of harmful chemicals. i dont have a ton of experience in this area, but my job at work recently has been replacing all inventory parts with their RoHS equivalent. the labels still have warnings all over them that the chemicals or materials inside might cause cancer or have been shown to cause cancer in a few states. we had a meeting about this at work a few weeks ago and some of the documentation provided for everyone showed several RoHS compliant parts having more dangerous chemicals than lead.

i dont know the RoHS standards or specifications, but i know what ive seen on labels and it seems like a lead sandwich would be a better choice in some instances.

 

[SuperFungus]

I would think that the AC in the wire is much more likely to kill a kid chewing on the wire than whatever trace amounts of lead he might pick up from the plastic, and thats something you can't avoid. As for talking with your dollar, i'd say that you've tried but now it's time to drop the idealism. I've never heard of anyone, child or otherwise, getting lead poising from the wires in christmas lights. If you get everyone you know to never spend a penny on lights with the coating again, it won't make a difference, sorry. And it shouldn't. The manufacturer obviously has some fire-safty code that it must comply with, and using lead in the manufacturing process is almost certainly the cheapest way of doing this, and since there is absolutely no proof, or even evidence as far as i know, of a health hazard, why shouldn't they use lead? I'm not even out of HS and have been crawling though fiberglass insulation to run wires, etc. more times than i care to remember, as well as de-sheathing an entire house with my father (also very healthy, and he tells sories about playing with the mercury from thermometers, and chassing the mosquito fogger trucks on his bike when he was a kid) of asbestos shingles, i've even accidentaly knocked the valve off the top of an old tank of freon. No cancer or other problems, i'm as healthy as i could hope to be. I say this because, while caution is certainly necessary, I believe that the real risks invovled with many of these materials are really blown out of proportion. Bottom line, making sure your child doesn't chew on the lights is an easier, cheaper and far more effective way of keeping him/her safe than making the lights safe to chew will ever be.

 

[MrDudeMan]

Originally posted by: SuperFungus
I would think that the AC in the wire is much more likely to kill a kid chewing on the wire than whatever trace amounts of lead he might pick up from the plastic, and thats something you can't avoid. As for talking with your dollar, i'd say that you've tried but now it's time to drop the idealism. I've never heard of anyone, child or otherwise, getting lead poising from the wires in christmas lights. If you get everyone you know to never spend a penny on lights with the coating again, it won't make a difference, sorry. And it shouldn't. The manufacturer obviously has some fire-safty code that it must comply with, and using lead in the manufacturing process is almost certainly the cheapest way of doing this, and since there is absolutely no proof, or even evidence as far as i know, of a health hazard, why shouldn't they use lead? I'm not even out of HS and have been crawling though fiberglass insulation to run wires, etc. more times than i care to remember, as well as de-sheathing an entire house with my father (also very healthy, and he tells sories about playing with the mercury from thermometers, and chassing the mosquito fogger trucks on his bike when he was a kid) of asbestos shingles, i've even accidentaly knocked the valve off the top of an old tank of freon. No cancer or other problems, i'm as healthy as i could hope to be. I say this because, while caution is certainly necessary, I believe that the real risks invovled with many of these materials are really blown out of proportion. Bottom line, making sure your child doesn't chew on the lights is an easier, cheaper and far more effective way of keeping him/her safe than making the lights safe to chew will ever be.

while you have a good point, i would be careful to have an inflated sense of security simply because you appear to be healthy now. you are playing with fire by not wearing a mask in an attic and breathing freon. its only a matter of time before you get burned.

 

[Born2bwire]

Originally posted by: MrDudeMan

Originally posted by: SuperFungus
I would think that the AC in the wire is much more likely to kill a kid chewing on the wire than whatever trace amounts of lead he might pick up from the plastic, and thats something you can't avoid. As for talking with your dollar, i'd say that you've tried but now it's time to drop the idealism. I've never heard of anyone, child or otherwise, getting lead poising from the wires in christmas lights. If you get everyone you know to never spend a penny on lights with the coating again, it won't make a difference, sorry. And it shouldn't. The manufacturer obviously has some fire-safty code that it must comply with, and using lead in the manufacturing process is almost certainly the cheapest way of doing this, and since there is absolutely no proof, or even evidence as far as i know, of a health hazard, why shouldn't they use lead? I'm not even out of HS and have been crawling though fiberglass insulation to run wires, etc. more times than i care to remember, as well as de-sheathing an entire house with my father (also very healthy, and he tells sories about playing with the mercury from thermometers, and chassing the mosquito fogger trucks on his bike when he was a kid) of asbestos shingles, i've even accidentaly knocked the valve off the top of an old tank of freon. No cancer or other problems, i'm as healthy as i could hope to be. I say this because, while caution is certainly necessary, I believe that the real risks invovled with many of these materials are really blown out of proportion. Bottom line, making sure your child doesn't chew on the lights is an easier, cheaper and far more effective way of keeping him/her safe than making the lights safe to chew will ever be.

while you have a good point, i would be careful to have an inflated sense of security simply because you appear to be healthy now. you are playing with fire by not wearing a mask in an attic and breathing freon. its only a matter of time before you get burned.

Heh, yeah, you don't develp Mesothelioma overnight.

 

[bobsmith1492]

Originally posted by: MrDudeMan

Originally posted by: SuperFungus
I would think that the AC in the wire is much more likely to kill a kid chewing on the wire than whatever trace amounts of lead he might pick up from the plastic, and thats something you can't avoid. As for talking with your dollar, i'd say that you've tried but now it's time to drop the idealism. I've never heard of anyone, child or otherwise, getting lead poising from the wires in christmas lights. If you get everyone you know to never spend a penny on lights with the coating again, it won't make a difference, sorry. And it shouldn't. The manufacturer obviously has some fire-safty code that it must comply with, and using lead in the manufacturing process is almost certainly the cheapest way of doing this, and since there is absolutely no proof, or even evidence as far as i know, of a health hazard, why shouldn't they use lead? I'm not even out of HS and have been crawling though fiberglass insulation to run wires, etc. more times than i care to remember, as well as de-sheathing an entire house with my father (also very healthy, and he tells sories about playing with the mercury from thermometers, and chassing the mosquito fogger trucks on his bike when he was a kid) of asbestos shingles, i've even accidentaly knocked the valve off the top of an old tank of freon. No cancer or other problems, i'm as healthy as i could hope to be. I say this because, while caution is certainly necessary, I believe that the real risks invovled with many of these materials are really blown out of proportion. Bottom line, making sure your child doesn't chew on the lights is an easier, cheaper and far more effective way of keeping him/her safe than making the lights safe to chew will ever be.

while you have a good point, i would be careful to have an inflated sense of security simply because you appear to be healthy now. you are playing with fire by not wearing a mask in an attic and breathing freon. its only a matter of time before you get burned.

Freon won't hurt you any unless it's highly concentrated.
http://www.niehs.nih.gov/external/faq/freon.htm

"It is not a carcinogen, teratogen, or mutagen, and it does not damage the liver."

Sheesh, some paranoid people...

 

[MrDudeMan]

Originally posted by: bobsmith1492

Originally posted by: MrDudeMan

Originally posted by: SuperFungus
I would think that the AC in the wire is much more likely to kill a kid chewing on the wire than whatever trace amounts of lead he might pick up from the plastic, and thats something you can't avoid. As for talking with your dollar, i'd say that you've tried but now it's time to drop the idealism. I've never heard of anyone, child or otherwise, getting lead poising from the wires in christmas lights. If you get everyone you know to never spend a penny on lights with the coating again, it won't make a difference, sorry. And it shouldn't. The manufacturer obviously has some fire-safty code that it must comply with, and using lead in the manufacturing process is almost certainly the cheapest way of doing this, and since there is absolutely no proof, or even evidence as far as i know, of a health hazard, why shouldn't they use lead? I'm not even out of HS and have been crawling though fiberglass insulation to run wires, etc. more times than i care to remember, as well as de-sheathing an entire house with my father (also very healthy, and he tells sories about playing with the mercury from thermometers, and chassing the mosquito fogger trucks on his bike when he was a kid) of asbestos shingles, i've even accidentaly knocked the valve off the top of an old tank of freon. No cancer or other problems, i'm as healthy as i could hope to be. I say this because, while caution is certainly necessary, I believe that the real risks invovled with many of these materials are really blown out of proportion. Bottom line, making sure your child doesn't chew on the lights is an easier, cheaper and far more effective way of keeping him/her safe than making the lights safe to chew will ever be.

while you have a good point, i would be careful to have an inflated sense of security simply because you appear to be healthy now. you are playing with fire by not wearing a mask in an attic and breathing freon. its only a matter of time before you get burned.

Freon won't hurt you any unless it's highly concentrated.
http://www.niehs.nih.gov/external/faq/freon.htm

"It is not a carcinogen, teratogen, or mutagen, and it does not damage the liver."

Sheesh, some paranoid people...

im not paranoid at all. you cant try to convince me that breathing in ANY chemical is a good idea. i keep everything out of my body that doesnt absolutely have to be there. that isnt paranoia - its trying to remain healthy and avoid terrible things like cancer.

 

[bobsmith1492]

Originally posted by: MrDudeMan

Originally posted by: bobsmith1492

Originally posted by: MrDudeMan

Originally posted by: SuperFungus
I would think that the AC in the wire is much more likely to kill a kid chewing on the wire than whatever trace amounts of lead he might pick up from the plastic, and thats something you can't avoid. As for talking with your dollar, i'd say that you've tried but now it's time to drop the idealism. I've never heard of anyone, child or otherwise, getting lead poising from the wires in christmas lights. If you get everyone you know to never spend a penny on lights with the coating again, it won't make a difference, sorry. And it shouldn't. The manufacturer obviously has some fire-safty code that it must comply with, and using lead in the manufacturing process is almost certainly the cheapest way of doing this, and since there is absolutely no proof, or even evidence as far as i know, of a health hazard, why shouldn't they use lead? I'm not even out of HS and have been crawling though fiberglass insulation to run wires, etc. more times than i care to remember, as well as de-sheathing an entire house with my father (also very healthy, and he tells sories about playing with the mercury from thermometers, and chassing the mosquito fogger trucks on his bike when he was a kid) of asbestos shingles, i've even accidentaly knocked the valve off the top of an old tank of freon. No cancer or other problems, i'm as healthy as i could hope to be. I say this because, while caution is certainly necessary, I believe that the real risks invovled with many of these materials are really blown out of proportion. Bottom line, making sure your child doesn't chew on the lights is an easier, cheaper and far more effective way of keeping him/her safe than making the lights safe to chew will ever be.

while you have a good point, i would be careful to have an inflated sense of security simply because you appear to be healthy now. you are playing with fire by not wearing a mask in an attic and breathing freon. its only a matter of time before you get burned.

Freon won't hurt you any unless it's highly concentrated.
http://www.niehs.nih.gov/external/faq/freon.htm

"It is not a carcinogen, teratogen, or mutagen, and it does not damage the liver."

Sheesh, some paranoid people...

im not paranoid at all. you cant try to convince me that breathing in ANY chemical is a good idea. i keep everything out of my body that doesnt absolutely have to be there. that isnt paranoid - its trying to remain healthy and avoid terrible things like cancer.

I hate to break it to you, but you breathe in chemicals all the time - O2, H2O, N2, CO2 are some of the more popular. There's nothing wrong with being a "chemical" - the question is whether or not it will hurt you. Short term, if it doesn't poison you, you're fine. Long term, if it doesn't cause mutations in cells or irritate you and stimulate your immune system (causing possible allergies) or accumulate to toxic levels, you're fine. According to that website, freon does none of these except possibly in very high concentrations in the short-term if you have heart conditions.

 

[MrDudeMan]

nevermind...not relevant to the topic

 

[bobsmith1492]

Yeesh, touched a nerve... sorry. I just wanted to reassure you that you don't need to worry too much about such things. We will all die some day, and while I'm all for being healthy (somewhat of a health-nut myself), just don't get carried away. Ok, I'll let this one rest; sorry for the sidetrack.

 

[SuperFungus]

Originally posted by: MrDudeMan

Originally posted by: SuperFungus
I would think that the AC in the wire is much more likely to kill a kid chewing on the wire than whatever trace amounts of lead he might pick up from the plastic, and thats something you can't avoid. As for talking with your dollar, i'd say that you've tried but now it's time to drop the idealism. I've never heard of anyone, child or otherwise, getting lead poising from the wires in christmas lights. If you get everyone you know to never spend a penny on lights with the coating again, it won't make a difference, sorry. And it shouldn't. The manufacturer obviously has some fire-safty code that it must comply with, and using lead in the manufacturing process is almost certainly the cheapest way of doing this, and since there is absolutely no proof, or even evidence as far as i know, of a health hazard, why shouldn't they use lead? I'm not even out of HS and have been crawling though fiberglass insulation to run wires, etc. more times than i care to remember, as well as de-sheathing an entire house with my father (also very healthy, and he tells sories about playing with the mercury from thermometers, and chassing the mosquito fogger trucks on his bike when he was a kid) of asbestos shingles, i've even accidentaly knocked the valve off the top of an old tank of freon. No cancer or other problems, i'm as healthy as i could hope to be. I say this because, while caution is certainly necessary, I believe that the real risks invovled with many of these materials are really blown out of proportion. Bottom line, making sure your child doesn't chew on the lights is an easier, cheaper and far more effective way of keeping him/her safe than making the lights safe to chew will ever be.

while you have a good point, i would be careful to have an inflated sense of security simply because you appear to be healthy now. you are playing with fire by not wearing a mask in an attic and breathing freon. its only a matter of time before you get burned.

I think I may have almost made it sound as if I have a death wish which I can assure you aren?t true. The Freon was outdoors, I wasn?t breathing it (it was interesting to watch by the way the entire tank was frozen solid as the Freon escaped, even in the middle of a very warm summer day) I wore a mask with the asbestos and long sleeves and pants with the fiberglass. All I meant to say was that I think that most of the real dangers with materials like this come when you are in daily prolonged contact with them, like someone said you don't develop cancer overnight. For example, I've heard that full service Gas station attendants were prone to developed certain diseases because of over-exposure to gas fumes, but to suggest that someone should wear some type of respirator when they fill their tank is ludicrous, the risk simply doesn?t apply to them. Even though I?ve spent my fair share of time rolling around in fiberglass and other hazardous chemicals (model making anyone?) I have full faith that even my meager amount of caution (being careful to not disturb the asbestos too much and to not breathe the dust etc.)is enough to protect me from such sporadic and short lived contact. Thanks for the concern, but i'm willing to 'risk it'

 

[dkozloski]

It sounds to me like stomping on pissants while elephants are running up and down the halls. Stay away from tobacco, McDonald's, and street pharmacists and you're on your way to healthy living.

 

[CoachB]

Living will kill you!

The EPA (in response to lawsuits by Greenpiece and The See-era club) today announced that it will be issuing limits on the amount of living that can be done in a lifetime. Numerous studies have shown that long-term exposure to living is extremely hazardous. "The more living one is exposed to the greater the risks" one EPA spokesperson stated. " In a few documented cases, intense short term exposure to living has resulted in immediate death".

A un-identified activist, when informed of EPAs decision mused, " Why is EPA just now taking action. We've all heard the saying 'Live Fast, Die Young'. It's criminal that it has taken this long for the government to react."

EPA director, Polly Tician, explained the regulatory delay during today's announcement. "The EPA has banned and/or regulated all other substances and activities, yet people continued to die. It finally became apparent that the real risk was exposure to living. We are confident that today's landmark regulations will bring an end to death by living. It will require extreme sacrifice on the part of our nation, but we are committed to eliminating living so that no one will ever again be exposed to the possibility of death".

:roll::laugh:

 

[DrPizza]

Originally posted by: herm0016
you can buy a string of 50 from home depot for about 6 bucks. 50 leds, the resistors and the connectors would probably cost you 20 or 30 bucks. plus where are you going to get the weather proof "faceted" lens things so that the led ends up with a wider dispersal angle so you can see them more than 20 degrees off axis?

No way. (at least I highly doubt you'll find a string of 50 LED lights that cheaply) They're still quite a bit more expensive than the regular cheapy lights that Home Depot carries (which aren't LED, afaik)