The Difference between C7/C9 Bulbs and Cords and C7/C9 Plug and Play String Lights

by | Nov 22, 2021

Transcript

Well, I know this looks like a hot mess, but I’ve put these lights up here to really show you the answer to a question we hear a lot of. I’ve got two different kinds of LED multi-light sets out here. So, the first one I’m gonna show you is this one. So, this set is a C9, actually comes in two pieces.

There’s a C9, 18-gauge cord, and we’ve installed multicolor C9 bulbs in it. And you’ll see, like, this is a traditional C9 bulb shape and it has an E17 base that goes into an E17 socket. And so that’s one style of Christmas lights. And we call these bulbs and cords because that would kinda make sense because, you know, you have, like, a bulb and a cord. So, let’s look at what else I have.

So, over here on the right, I have what is called a Christmas light string. That’s what we’ve decided to call it. And it actually has a three-wire wiring harness. And the great thing about the engineering with this light set is that you can run hundreds of feet of these together in series on a single outlet. Now, this cord and bulb combination, you can’t run more than 250 feet of 18-gauge wire because that is the maximum light line specification.

So, it doesn’t actually matter if you have LED bulbs or glass bulbs. You can’t go more than 250 feet. So, for some projects, that’s perfect. But for major projects, like in cities where you’re wrapping trees or you have just… We’ve seen these on 60, 80, 100-foot trees, this is a great solution. I’ll turn out the light, so you can kind of get an idea better, there we go, of what these look like because we find that LED lights always look brighter after dark. And so, there we go. There’s some blue and a green.

And these bulbs cannot be replaced. In order to be moisture, water-resistant, you certainly wouldn’t wanna put them in the mud or anything like that. These are made to where the base and the bulb don’t separate. Now, we know there are some LED light strings on the market where the bulbs are replaceable, but what we’ve found is that the LED lights are so sensitive to corrosion and the change in resistance, and they seem to be more susceptible to rust that we’ve made the choice to carry only lights that have non-removable, non-replaceable bulbs. And also, these bulbs, these light strings rather, they’ll have a rectifier which is going to smooth the waveform and reduce as much flicker as possible. And this is located at the beginning and the middle of the string.

So, you have light strings as a choice and you have bulbs and cords as a choice. So, hopefully, this helps you as you’re planning your Christmas display. Let us know if you have any questions. And I’m Shellie at Christmas Light Source.

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