Forever Bright 2003?

[PhotonWrangler]

Re: Forever Bright 2003

I've just found aa 60-LED knockoff of the ForeverBright "flame" style LEDs at Home Improvements for $12.99. They seem a tiny bit dimmer than the FBs, but they're also a little a little bit more diffused, so this might be why they appear a little dimmer.

 

[The_LED_Museum]

Re: Forever Bright 2003

Are they "Long Lasting LED Christmas Lights", like the ones I found at Bartell's last month?
http://insulatorz.home.att.net/xmas3.htm

 

[Darell]

Re: Forever Bright 2003

If it is transformerless design as you say, then I believe they are infriging on the Foreverbrite patent.

 

[KEN TYE]

I too have purchased 5 strings from brookstone. I am very happy with the lights. but I tried to order from brite lite and they were more $ and 2 weeks on back order. brookstone sent mine very fast,, well pleased with them /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/thumbsup.gif

 

[PhotonWrangler]

Re: Forever Bright 2003

[ QUOTE ]
The LED Museum said:
Are they "Long Lasting LED Christmas Lights", like the ones I found at Bartell's last month?
http://insulatorz.home.att.net/xmas3.htm

[/ QUOTE ]
Nope... they look like the FB 2003 series lamps in the Pinecone or "Flame" shape. They come in a plain white box with a clear window along a aportion of the box, allowing some of the lights to show through. They're packaged in a sorta reusable-looking plastic carrier, rather than just being stuffed into the box.

The set includes red, amber, green and blue lamps. The lamps are socketed and removable.

The box says "Vadsmith 03218" for the part number. There's also an SKU-looking code of 248584 on the box.

I'm not set up to post photos yet, but I'll fix that shortly, as soon as I get a hosting account set up.

 

[KEN TYE]

as far as the 60hz flicker is concerned, you might plug them all end to end and run them through a bridge rectifier to get rid of the flicker . I would assume its 30hz flicker that you are seeing (60hz half wave )

 

[The_LED_Museum]

[ QUOTE ]
KEN TYE said:
as far as the 60hz flicker is concerned, you might plug them all end to end and run them through a bridge rectifier to get rid of the flicker . I would assume its 30hz flicker that you are seeing (60hz half wave )

[/ QUOTE ]
It's *possible* that some of the longer sets have their LEDs wired so that half of them come on during the first half of the AC waveform, and the other half come on during the second half of the AC waveform. If this is the case, half the set will stay dark if you try to run it from DC.

I'm not saying this is going to happen, but it MIGHT. So it's something you'll want to watch for if you do this.

 

[PhotonWrangler]

Re: Forever Bright 2003

[ QUOTE ]
The LED Museum said:
Are they "Long Lasting LED Christmas Lights", like the ones I found at Bartell's last month?
http://insulatorz.home.att.net/xmas3.htm

[/ QUOTE ]
Here's the photos of the FB knockoff -

http://www.tjtech.org/~CPF/photonwrangler/box-sml.jpg

http://www.tjtech.org/~CPF/photonwrangler/lighted-sml.jpg

 

[Darell]

Re: Forever Bright 2003

Oh yeah - those look just like last year's model.

 

[The_LED_Museum]

Re: Forever Bright 2003

They definitely LOOK like Foreverbrights, but they're affixed to the frame all wrong, and it looks like this model has removeable "bulbs", while real Foreverbrights have "permanent" "bulbs" you can't take out, and have a different frame they're mounted on inside the box.

 

[Darkaway]

Re: Forever Bright 2003

My local Albertsons (Saugus, Ca.) has Forever Brights for $9.95. That's for a string of 70 in all white, all red, or multi-colored. Sorry don't remember the exact colors.

 

[PhotonWrangler]

Re: Forever Bright 2003

[ QUOTE ]
The LED Museum said:
They definitely LOOK like Foreverbrights, but they're affixed to the frame all wrong, and it looks like this model has removeable "bulbs", while real Foreverbrights have "permanent" "bulbs" you can't take out, and have a different frame they're mounted on inside the box.

[/ QUOTE ]
FWIW, the store that I got these at seems to specialize in plain-white-box knockoffs of lots of things, and most of them seem to be originating from China.

I like the fact that the bulbs are removable. The package includes two spare bulbs (red, in this case) and two spare micro fuses. The included instructions say "replace only with 2 volt LED type lamp" so they're apparently wired in a single series string.

 

[rlhess]

Re: Forever Bright 2003

I had my order which I placed on 10/27 just cancelled due to no stock by brite-lite.com. GAK.

My wife found some LED lights at Target, but they are not Forever Bright. They'll have to do.

The lights are 2V LEDs and are 60 to a string. Two of the strings are 120 lights, but there is a crossover so that the first half and the second half are two separate series strings (not alternated).

They're not as bright as an Arc AAA <smile>. I hope they're bright enough.

Oh, and no blues.

I got one string of green "trees" and one string of red "candy canes" the candy canes have red LEDs and are painted red and white. These unicolor strings are 120 lights each for I think $12.99.

I also got, for $7.99 each two 60-light strings. One is 1 cm marbles the other are stars. No blues, but multi-colors. red orange green something like that.

Each 60 light string is drawing 40mA according to the spec sheet AND they certainly flicker.

I calculated that at 10 cents per kWh, running them 24/7 will cost me 7 cents per day for the six 60-LED segments, or a bit over $3 for the 45 days I'll probably run them.

Cheers,

Richard

 

[PhotonWrangler]

Re: Forever Bright 2003

[ QUOTE ]
rlhess said:
I got one string of green "trees" and one string of red "candy canes" the candy canes have red LEDs and are painted red and white. These unicolor strings are 120 lights each for I think $12.99.



[/ QUOTE ]
I've seen the red candy canes on someone's lawn here
and they're impressive. Very distinctive, deep cherry-red
appearance, a nice look for a Christmas decoration.

 

[PhotonWrangler]

Re: Forever Bright 2003

[ QUOTE ]
The LED Museum said:
They definitely LOOK like Foreverbrights, but they're affixed to the frame all wrong, and it looks like this model has removeable "bulbs", while real Foreverbrights have "permanent" "bulbs" you can't take out, and have a different frame they're mounted on inside the box.

[/ QUOTE ]
I took another close look at both sets, and the facets in the knockoff lamps have a perfectly symmetrical diamond shape to them, while the facets in the FBs have a very slightly elongated diamond-shape. Somebody went to a fair amount of trouble to copy the shape of the lamps very closely, but not perfectly.

 

[Jake]

Re: Forever Bright 2003

ARGH! Well, my brand new 2003 sets from Brookstone are already having issues. On two of the sets I got, an LED has already crapped out on me. The things have less than 36 hours use on them, so for LEDs to start dying already is not a good sign. I can't return them for an exchange cuz I already threw the boxes out. Oh well, so much for having faith in the new ForeverBrights.

 

[rlhess]

Re: Forever Bright 2003

My 1 cm (10mm as they call it) marbles flashed on and off and then died. My wife will exchange them, but they're not the FB, they are the Target house brand.

So far the stars, trees, and candy canes are holding up well. Yes the candy canes are nice, the trees are a yellow-green and there are no blues in any of them.

Richard

 

[yuandrew]

Re: Forever Bright 2003

Yeah, the Target brands are not very good quality. I'd stick to Forever Brights (Check Savon Drugs or Rite Aid; that is where I got mines).

 

[Empath]

Re: Forever Bright 2003

We just decorated the tree and installed my Forever Brights. They're the 2003 version from Walgreen, 3 strands of 35 lights per strand. All lit, and all burn beautifully bright, with the blue as being the most noticeable (to me). Since they now are non-replaceable, I guess Forever Bright has developed a great deal of confidence in them. I'm glad I got them.

 

[PhotonBoy]

Re: Forever Bright 2003

The story behind Forever Brights:

http://www.philly.com/mld/inquirer/news/front/7371918.htm