New solar powered LED outdoor walkway light

I've seen something like this at my local Home Depot. Once in awhile they even have a display powered up with a transformer so one can gauge the illumination patterns.

tsask said:

I just saw a TV ad for something pretty cool making use of 2 technologies. solar powered multi white LED walkway light. 2 fo $35 plus shipping. seems like a good idea.

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There's load of these in UK, has been for a couple of years now.

£3 each

abvidledUK said:

There's load of these in UK, has been for a couple of years now.£3 each

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that's a much better deal. I may wait until I visit the "Old Country" S. Wales, to get mine

I've tried a couple of these and they are mostly useless in my opinion. They use a very small solar cell to charge 1 or 2 AA rechargables. To get even moderate run times, they run the LED so dim that it provides no useful illumination, it's more of a marker light. You can see it when you look at it but it won't light up adjacent areas even 6 inches away. And although the advertised run time is 8-12 hours, in reality is less than 4 hours on it's best day.

The home store type solar LED lights are pretty much toys, BUT, there's quite a few advertisements in Home Power (www.homepower.com) magazine which have bright LEDs & real solar panels and batteries to boot. I have a 5w solar panel w/a 12v 8Ah battery.... plenty of power for anything useful.

There's a major advantage to the corded power walkway lights over the solar type. My parents have the corded type in their front yard for 8 years now. They added a few solar ones to the yard which were stolen in less then a week.

that's pretty cheap, stealing someones walkway lights. Every year I put out an orange ropelight for H'ween and worry about it getting nicked.

how about those solar spot lights? ive seen them at homedepot and wonder if its worth it? are they strong enought to illuminate a small tree/bush?

beefy6969 said:

how about those solar spot lights? ive seen them at homedepot and wonder if its worth it? are they strong enought to illuminate a small tree/bush?

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If it's a Bonsai, I would say yes:laughing:

Best regards

_____
Tom

Unfortunately most of the solar walkway lights I've seen are pretty dull lights, almost useless. Would be nice to find one that puts out some really useable light for the front of my house.

I bought eight of the generic solar walkway lights and placed them in 30"x 8" planters on my deck railing and being amber don't attract any bugs. I do notice the length of day determines if they will still be lit near dawn. High winds have taken their toll however, two of the lites have been destroyed when the planters they were in blew off the railing and turned turtle. To me it was no problem, now I have spare parts to upgrade the others with.

My wife bought a bunch of solar powered LED lights off of QVC. We have them around our patio, and around the garden and front walk. They come on automatically at night and charge during the day. We've had them for over a year now and put them away in winter. However, I left one out all year and it still charges and lights up most of the night.

I admit that the light given off is mostly for marking one's path but it does provide some illumination.
I did just see the solar powered spot light on TV. Knowing my wife she will probably find some use for one of them.