BULB DISCUSSION BOARDS > Christmas Lighting

Modern Bubble lights from Simply Lighting.

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Chris W. Millinship:
I have an update about these particular lights if you`re interested? I meant to post this sooner but quite frankly things have been so busy lately that it just slipped my mind until now. Anyway-

I had this one set of 7 bubble lights strung out accross a wall over christmas, with the sockets clipped to the wiring of another set and all bulbs pointing up as they should be. I noticed that very few of them started bubbling on their own. Normally just one would start up, then later on especially if it was warmer in here, another one or 2 may start, but the rest didn`t. They needed a good shake, sometimes quite hard, before they`d get going. I originally put this down to those bulbs inside. They are indeed good quality, probably the "energy saving" long life kind that are a slightly higher voltage rating and lower wattage so they burn a little cooler, I`d say 130 volts and 5 watts as a guess. But although they`re going to last a long time on my 110 volt transformer (in Britain our mains is 240v so I have a big transformer to run my American lights with), and won`t melt the plastic bodies either, they don`t generate quite enough heat to start the bubble tubes off.

I also have a set of the recent Noma brand repro. bubble lights- with the red/green bases and red/gold tubes- and they seem to be different. The size is very similar and the C7 bulbs inside again seem good quality and probably the same power, but the bubble tubes are different. They started bubbling much sooner, and the bubbles were a bit smaller. The Simply Lighting lights (Roman brand) would suddenly start with a bit of a kick, but the Noma ones gradually started and built up the bubbling. I guess the Noma-brand ones (made by Midwest of Cannon Falls so I`m aware) use a better quality bubble tube, perhaps the activator (crystalline stuff in the bottom) is different, or maybe the tubes are pumped down to a lower vacuum so they boil at a lower temperature.

Anyway I have concluded that although the sets themselves are great quality, overall they`re not as good quality as the Noma ones you may find because of those reluctant bubble tubes, but the bright bold colours make up for that- Noma`s ones are only red and green bodies with gold/red tubes. Also there`s loads of other styles and colours from Simply Lighting including ones with gold or silver glitter in their tubes that sound good. If (or most probably when) I get some of those others, I`ll post another update here.

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-chris

http://members.ebay.co.uk/aboutme/chrismillinship

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