Friday, November 19, 2010

Sterile? Or gaudy?

Some people think all-white lites are sterile.  Some people think multi-colored lites are gaudy.  I fall somewhere between these two viewpoints... and I confess that I have been influenced by the Christmas lites we have seen at Whistler, BC. For some reason that probably doesn't bear too close an examination, I like the blue ones, the ones which seem almost too deep blue to really see well.

We've never decorated Eolian with lites for the Christmas season.  See, there is this problem with living on 30 amps - there was no power to spare.

This year, things will be different.  This year, LED Christmas lites have gotten inexpensive enough to be a financially practical alternative.

And why LED's you ask?  Well, because all three of these strands draw only 0.2 amps... combined!  Our electrical budget can afford that (I am ignoring the power consumed by that cute little $4 timer).

These three strands stretch a total of 100 feet, which should be enough to go up our forestay, across the triatic stay, and down the mizzen topping lift.  I know that I am going to have to rig some kind of reinforcement where the main and mizzen halyards hoist the lite strands...  it'll be an interesting problem to solve.

I'll post pictures when they are up and lit.

But that won't be until after Thanksgiving.
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3 comments:

Mike said...

We need to head to Walmart to pick up some lights too. Have you come across any solar powered ones?

Robert Salnick said...

Mike: Yes we have, but I'm afraid I can't remember where it was that we saw them (maybe it was Home Depot?). The solar-powered strings are much shorter than we needed so I didn't pay too much attention to them.

bob

Kaci said...

Looks good!

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