Christmas lights are a big part of the holiday season. As November and December roll around, you might see strands of lights everywhere on Christmas trees, houses, shrubs, bushes and even the occasional car! Have you ever wondered how these lights work? Why is it that if you pull out or break one of the bulbs, the whole strand of lights goes out? And how do they create the lights that sequence in different color patterns?
If you were to go back in time 30 or 40 years and look at how people decorated their houses and trees with lights, you would find that most people used small 120 volt incandescent bulbs. Each bulb was a 5 or 10 watt bulb like the bulb you find in a night light. You can still find strands of these bulbs today, but they aren’t very common anymore for three reasons:
