Mod Xmas lights to use as night light?

[greg_in_canada]

My daughter's bedroom and my office is in the basement down a narrow dark hall. I have an LED nightlight plugged into the wall there but it is pretty dim, especially if you have just come from a brightly lit room upstairs. (The light switches are poorly placed so you have to walk half way down the hall before getting to the switch.)

So I was looking at some half-price Christmas (white) light strings today and was thinking of stringing one up as a night light. The power consumption is 5 watts so I'd like to drop that in half or so, so I won't feel guilty leaving it plugged in year-round. And a bit lower current would help the LED life if they are being over-driven to look brighter. So I was thinking of adding a resistor to accomplish this.

Another idea: if the LEDs are wired into two strings, each one driven on one half cycle of the AC, then perhaps I could just put a rectifier diode (eg. 1N4005) in series. That would prevent one string from lighting and cut the power consumption in half. If the lit half ever gets dim / warn out I could reverse the diode and use the other string of LEDs, doubling the useful life.

I wish I had bought them today so I could check out how they are wired but I hadn't though of the diode idea.

Any comments on the resistor value to use or the diode idea? I think it was a string of 70 LEDs but I looked at so many different sets I'm not totally sure. I'll probably go back tomorrow and get a set or two to play with.

Thanks - Greg

 

[greg_in_canada]

I went back and looked at them again. I decided not to buy the one I was originally looking at because it was too long (24', 70 LEDs). I bought a 35 LED set. The box doesn't say the power consumption. I assume about 2.5W (half of the 70 LED set).

I don't need to cut the power consumption in half but I might want to add a resistor to reduce the current a bit.

Greg