Oh for the days (about 10 years ago) when we had 3 and 4 channel Christmas lights instead of these 2 channel ones just driven back to back, you got far more interesting colour patterns!
Chase that chased. Twinkle that twinkled. Aah, the days. Swap some with dropping capacitors and series inrush limiters and the rest will last for years, even if used every night.
i do like the mellow (and less harsh) feel of the coloured christmas lights, the filiment lights althought I have probably been conditioned to prefer them as thats what I first knew.
$8 - Nicely done, didn’t know about the H Bridge truth table. I have a project that needs to flip the polarity so this teardown is super helpful. Thanks! The $8 is a Twitter thing. 😊
Keep in mind that when using an H-bridge to alternate polarity with just a single rail supply you cannot ground the load as the load is driven between positive and ground but on alternate legs.
That's soo cute. I can't believe they all light up with that small powerbank But still it's dc and safe. Unlike the old Christmas lights which shock you from everywhere. But I loved the non led old type of Christmas lights.
If keeping the last setting is really important for an application perhaps wiring the microcontroller power pins to a pair of AAA batteries (or a 3V coin cell?) with a diode in series will give it enough voltage to remember the last setting without turning the LEDs on. The diode in series with the batteries will prevent charging the non-rechargeable batteries when USB power is available and provide voltage drop so that the LEDs do not light up powered by batteries, although they may light up for a while with fresh batteries until their voltage drops from 1.65V to 1.5V
I finally done it, I created a 30x35x60mm box to control these LED strips with wife approval status. ESP32 for effects, last preset storage, no annoying flashy effects, only the ones I like and PWM control, D24V5F5 for power supply to ESP32 and DRV8871 DC motor H-bridge driver to drive the LEDs and a button for preset selection and power off. Soldered all together and it worked... after I connected button to the correct pin.
It is getting closer and closer to that time of the year where we buy random Christmas tat. Its also my favourite time of year because the lights, the events and all... Christmas is just around the corner.
Last year I revived few LED Christmas lights that had H-Bridge and controller in one chip. The chip was dead, I believe because I plugged it out and in too quick. I could not find a small suitable H-Bridge for up to 36V, so I bought massive H-Bridge in size of this whole controller, Arduino, buck converter, put them together and wrote a software with my own preferred patterns AND remember the last pattern. I liked my candle flickering effect the most. But controller was HUGE! I would love to minimize the design and still be able to use Arduino or ESP-32 for patterns, but a smaller H-Bridge and 36V->5V voltage regulator. These lights would work for me as they have the H-Bridge, 5V already as input. I just would have to strip controller chip, replace it with Arduino and I would be able to reuse the button. Sadly we don't have this store around here.
clive its ok for the picture to swamp out or to flash thats the clive experience after all i know people ask you to tame the light and stuff but we would like to have the full experience ,that means we want to see the flashing the swamping out of picture and all the fumbling in between a simple verbal warning is more than enough if the product blinded you i also want to be blinded ,if its flashing i want to see it !! thats the full product's experience after all and thats what the product your taking apart provides
That is a weirdly high level of precision on that timer. I'd expect a "close enough" internal oscillator in the microcontroller, not a crystal. Would adding a beefy capacitor in parallel with the little one extend the memory lifespan by any useful amount? Minutes, rather than seconds?
I wrote some software for a PIC microcontroller for a daily timer that used the internal oscillator. The drift was way too much, and was affected by a falling battery voltage.
@@bigclivedotcom Oh, yeah, it's definitely not a good way to do a timer, but it is a cheap way, and I'm surprised they didn't go with the cheapest possible approach...
It's less about precision and more about power consumption. Microcontrollers often include very low power oscillators intended for real time clock use which can continue run whilst the rest of the micro is in a low power sleep state. Those crystals cost pennies since they are so widely used.
I grabbed a similar USB set, but it only has little 0603 LED chip in slightly milky blobs on several strings of wire in the same arrangement of alternating polarity. The driver unit also has an infrared decoder and comes with an RCU. In its low intensity draws just enough power to satisfy a generic power bank, but on ramping up and down modes can suddenly let it go dormant. I've been unfolding and folding it back, and storing carefully, and it keeps just working. Haven't disassembled it: it works, so I don't have to trash/repurpose it; and Clive takes things to bits so we don't have to.
I don't mind auto off timers for energy saving purposes, but only if (and I stress the IF) they have an option to turn the timer function off. I have some air purifiers that I run on zigbee controlled timers, and they have a power saver function to turn them off after a couple of hours, which was super annoying with no way to customise it, and you had to press a momentary switch to turn them on... so I bypassed the timer by adding a tiny cheap switch on the back of the switch (inside the unit) that makes it think the button is constantly being pressed (which resets the timer so no auto off, and it makes it turn on automatically when the timer clicks on).
Got a question! I have a LLC quasi resonant PSU that I want to send to you to possibly do a video on. How would I get in contact with you to get a postal address etc? The reason I want to send it to you is I lowered the voltage and wanted to adjust it back up but it wouldn't. I replaced the potentiometer which was what I suspected had failed. This didn't fix it so I thought it could be good for you to do a video on to troubleshoot and do a PCB breakdown It's a 600w dual voltage model that was bought as 30v output. Let me know if your interested.
That symbol on the microcontroller looks very similar to the Expressive logo, makers of the ESP chip range. It think they do make simpler chips other than the ESP range of controllers, would have to be super cheap to find their way into these types of products though....
It indeed looks similar to the Espressif logo, but rotated 270 degrees (or 90° CCW). It perfectly could be though, because originally Espressif manufactures cheap chipsets for the Chinese gadget market and instantly became "Famous" when they introduced the ESP8266 WiFi chip, which was also usable to the hobbyist community.
I suspect Expressif are having their chips cloned by knock-off fabricators, just like everyone else. ☹️ Their simpler processors *are* competitively cheap in OEM quantities, though.
The checkout counter at Aldi had a stack of multicolor 1M long LED tape reels for $3 so I got one. They use a Tuya app downloaded to a phone to talk to the controller by bluetooth. The app controls all the parallel RGB LEDS, color brightness,pattern change. The most fun a geek can have for $3. Unfortunately it can't be controlled without the app loading the pattern onto the controller, but then it runs on its own. I don't know if the app phones home to China. Tuya is a pretty big company.
I wonder if swapping the crystal for a higher frequency would make the full-white mode less flickery (or if the crystal is only used for the wakeup clock). Assuming we're not hitting chips limitations... and that having it automatically turn off and on at a much faster rate than the usual 8 hours on / 16 hours off is not a too annoying... which at some frequencies may lead it back to strobe-mode 😆 I remember having a Christmas light set with a similar design, it's tempting to try, just for shamelessly-useless fun!
It's flickery on camera, i bet you don't see it in person very much, especially not when it's just a little bit of added lighting. Increasing the frequency is not ideal, as it will increase switching losses on the H-bridge IC. So the whole string will be less bright, and if you start pushing it, you can also burn the H-bridge. H-bridge off-time tuning can be somewhat fragile, so up to a point it works fine, but it doesn't take much until it shorts itself out and dies, you don't get a lot of warning from increased temperature before that happens.
I had a similar set that ran off D cell batteries with 500 LEDs. Some of the connections at the pack broke loose and I decided to turn it on while troubleshooting. I actually got a nice zap from it, made my arm twitch and everything. Hooked up my multimeter and read 87 volts AC without the LEDs in circuit. Pretty surprising but I suppose they're running them in series pairs for efficiency.
Most microcontrollers can run on an internal RC oscillator for non-communication applications. This one must be so cheap that even with a crystal, it would be cheaper. Using a half bridges is probably cheaper than a pair of pnp/npn discrete transistors.
LOL! 😂 Yeah, wot?! No SOS flashy function! Oh why oh why do the chinese just love flashing lights... Maybe it just matches their power system which flickers away all the time. "Everything normal here"
@@fredfred2363 LOL it might be that,, the mains power in China is about as stable as the dictator sorry Government 🤣🤣🤣🤣 or they might all be gay but then the LEDs would all be pink. 🤦♂ 👌
It'd be nice to be able to mod multi-function lights to be less obnoxious with their patterns, like those "police light" strobes being omitted, but personally I'd scrap the lot of the patterns and have a higher frequency steady-on that can be dimmed down if need be, kind of like how those high-viz jacket lights we all bought u pon mass could be dimmed, although their PWM frequency is still annoying to my eyes, but that's just me... :)
I’ve a similar USB set from eBay, with thin wire and /the/ most gorgeous rainbow colours (they’re kind watercolour hues). But I wish they could be reprogrammed. There’s one particular shimmer they do that’s My Perfect Idea Of What Fairy Lights Should Look Like… that only happens during the Play All Programs function 😭
I guess I would use a logic analyzer to figure out the pattern, and then replicate that with a micro, maybe a pi pico. You can use the pi pico as a temporary logic analyzer too.
They will almost certainly be a 3-pin WS2812 protocol LED. I think the only change I had to make with mine when programming on a rpi pico was to output GRB instead of RGB
I have a question for you. Do you know how can I operate this set of lights with a timer? Since it has Thad bottom to turn them on and off, the timer doesn't turn them on, I have to be turning them on al the time. Very irritated, ohh, and by the way, my doesn't have a control remote just usb with the bottom tu turn them on and off and to switch between modes, any help will be appreciated thank you
It appears that the only features of the H- Bridge driver is to alternate the output polarity, since Hi-Z and L-L are not used. H-L => H-L and L-H => L-H. Doesn't this just mirror the input voltages? Aside from buffering the output voltage so as not to overdrive the PIC controller, why add the complexity of this chip (and the cost)?
I have one of those annoying power banks that turns off if the current draw is low. Luckly, Mr Carlson has a fix for that - look for "Power Bank Stay Awake". A simple 555 circuit that is easy to build.
I hate this trend of 2 channel fairy lights, especially these inverting ones. There was a small period of time when manufacturers still made the boards with full 4 channels capability and only used 2 by cheaping out on transistors. I liked to upgrade those to 4 channels. Luckily I have the nerves to repair the old rice lights so I'm still sticking with those.
First off, I love the videos.... I have been following you from across the pond over in the land of Canuckistan. So... As I watch more and more of your videos, I get the impression that walking into your house would be like a time capsule to the 70's disco with all the flashy lights. For some reason while I was watching g this video I had the song "" YMCA"" ratteling through my head. Or, it could be the -30, -35 we have been having lol.. Take care. Hope I didn't rattle the cage. That was not the intent..🌳🌳😎🌳🌳
Interesting, I have one of these and it has an unpopulated 8-pin spot that looks like where a NOR EEPROM would mount. I wonder if mine could be made to not forget it's settings by adding one.
I'm looking for a way to use a small section of fairy lights in a glass mason jar replacing the customary standard static led lights that usually comes with the top solar chip and battery. Accompanied with something like a ESP8266 that can receive receive and react to a sequence of patterns. To mimic a something like fireflies in a jar. I would prefer color leds but golden white would work.
Could you cut off the USB plug and run the lights on low voltage AC (with a resistor)? It would allow both halves of the LEDs to light and avoid the need for an H-bridge. I wonder if 50/60 Hertz would be sufficient for a "tolerable" level of flicker?
I've got some lights with a controller which seems the same as this. The timer function is set for the lights to come on at 16:30. Then after just a few weeks it's coming on about 6 hours later. Drifts out alot.
I just bought a cheap (and nasty) mood light from Poundstretcher. A ring of 6 white LEDs and a ring of 3 RGB LEDs with internal controllers and a SPDT switch to select multicolour/white mode. Totally naff but I bought it as I wanted the enclosure. So I replaced the miserable innards with an ESP8266 board loaded with the WLED firmware hooked up to a ring of 12 Neopixels all controlled by an app on my phone. Now it actually deserves to be called a mood light. 😁 The only downside to this hacking is it now requires a 5V 1A PSU to power it instead of the 3 AAA batteries it used to use.
Stupid question from someone who finds your channel fascinating but is definitely not an electrical type person. Does the crystal actually have a crystal in it??
Hey Clive have you seen the latest led lights in ALDI ? They have two retro sets that look like traditional fairy lights - Canterbury bells and Pickwick petal shades - they come in the full five colours including pink ❤ I love them and they look like the old lights from the 70’s and 80’s ❤
@@bigclivedotcom ALDI are selling them sets of 100 lights for £15 . The box has ALDI branding but I checked online and they look like the Noma lights .
Is there an easy way to change these so that they *never* flash? Would it just need a complete replacement for the power supply? Where I work there are some people who can't stand any flashing lights on the Xmas tree.
@@bigclivedotcom Two transistor astable multivibrator connected to the existing H-bridge? Replacing the controller with a cheap PIC might be even simpler.
I'm just curious what the hour rating is on those LEDs until you have to replace the whole string yeah. At least they're not embedded with your artificial tree. Those are a b**** to troubleshoot. I'm just saying
@@bigclivedotcom I have a string in the greenhouse, after running for a year 24/7, a crude luxmeter on the phone showed as ¼ of a new. The new runs at a timer/light sensor from dusk to midnight and dawn to 8. Timer and sensor probably uses more power than it saves, but the light lasts longer.
The past couple of years I've bought neopixels (addressable RGB LEDs) to fool around with. Twice I bought these mistaking them for addressable. They look alike, and ebay/aliexpress ads don't try very hard to be clear about which is which.
Hi, I got an led bulb that just blew up for no apparent reason. It seems completely shorted as it shut my circuit breaker off. If you're interested I can send it to you. But I don't know how to get in touch appart from comments
I have a very similar set thats RGB. Turns out they just use a standard WS2812 protocol and a rpi pico later I've got some lovely custom patterns all written up for them.
@@briancihak8271 a lot of the ones from amazon are fine. Search RGB Christmas lights and any that have the USB power like this video and show the same LEDs in multiple colours, or have multiple colour remote, should be good. Check they're 3-wire too. Think I got a 10m set for about £11. Some are inline and flat, some are the style in the video above. You will need to crack the plastic off the case to see which wire is which (usually silkscreened or easy to follow the power and ground from the USB socket), but after that just desolder the data pin and insert your own pico. The Pico 5v bus isn't technically rated for the amps that the strip will draw, but you can power the pico in parallel to create a single USB but be careful about back powering your PC when programming if you do this!
I wish China would sell just the h-bridge module and pic programmed just to make the alternating current. Have a bunch of dead xmas lights that would come back to life with a module like that.
To me hot melt glue looks more like some sort of inert plastic than "glue" that solvents can dissolve. In fact in my experience even acetone doesn't do much to it. Therefore I don't bother using IPA on it. Instead I gently pry it apart with a small flathead screwdriver and when it's securing something against a smooth plastic surface it often comes off in a satisfying manner.
methanol can help break the bound between hot-glue and a smooth surface. i do this alot and it works great. but if fragile things are hold by the hot-glue its better to use a heat gun (air) instead, not to rip or break things.
I've put nitro engines on Flite Test foamies before. Those airplanes are built using hot glue, and nitro engines burn primarily methanol(Nitromethane being a power adder). Raw fuel spills on exposed glue joints does de-chooch the hot glue quite readily.
Before I knew acetic acid dissolved hot melt glue I made my own custom kitchen LED fixtures out of a nice warm LED light hot melt glued into the enclosure. So oneday I was making pickle brine and the LED unit dropped out of the enclosure.
@bigclivedotcom are you also getting these YT ads for the "nomad security camera", a 360° wifi cam that screws into e.g. a porch light bulb socket. Seems like a good idea, but what are the safety implications for running such a device off your light circuits (some countries do not have earth leakage protection on light circuits). Also the ad is giving heavy spam / scam vibes. Any chance for a vid?
Could you use a 555 timer to make the H-Bridge do its thing? I'd like it to run at >10 KHz as well to eliminate the flicker. Also, that diode, is it to drop the voltage to the MCU? I'd moved it to the MCU instead.
Should be possible with an extra transistor to invert the output because you need a Q and Q_ for the H-bridge. We don't know what the voltage rating of the MCU and H-Bridge are. If they blow up at 5V then a diode to protect them from supplies with over-voltage is a cheap fix. Perhaps the silicon is sensitive to even slight reverse voltage and the diode would protect it.
Ultimate hack for higher brightness lights on all the time... Cut off the USB connector. Connect a 3 to 5v mains transformer with a series resistor no lower than 4.7ohms (at least 1W rated). Done. Enjoy.
I wanted to put some lights on something so I picked up a string of those blob LEDs on copper wire much to my surprise after I cut it they alternate.....
Not for accurate timing turning on the same time every day. 0.1% deviation is 1½ minute, a RC oscillator is far more inaccurate, the light would turn on and off at any time after a few days
This one's xtal.based timer is an advantage for accuracy and reduced parts count . All uC. / uP work on crystal generated clocks/ Freq. references..be they external or built in...timing loops use these same references...as base.
I took a nice pair of dollar store lights and just added two resistors and a usb cable to replace the battery pack. I wanted to use the ubiquitous dollar store power bank to power them but then it turns out it has low current detection, so I ended up on a rabbit hole making a pulse generator out of a 555 to raise the current to above threshold every 24 seconds.... I can use them now, but due to the timing capacitor size vs current supplied I have to plug it in, wait for it to shut off, then plug it in again lol
Hmm, in my typical re-purpose everything way, my mind is drawn to that sci-fi look I want to achieve in my hobby room. I would take the controller, solder a row of 2 leg bi-colour LEDs mounted behind a diffuser to the outputs of said controller and gaze at the gentle flip-flopping and crossfading of the 2 colours from the LEDs :) Hopefully that would work lol Yeah people say Im crazy but I dunno, I seem to see more than what it is in things and swing towards what it could be, if that makes sense. x
If the H bridge has - -, +- and -+ modes, they could’ve got three wires out of the circuit board (C1, C2 and +) and that would allow them to drive the lights at the same time without multiplexing between polarities. Basically pull C1 or C2 to the negative rail to turn either side on.
Needs you to add in the third wire, and the machine they use is designed to use 2 wires only. Automatic machine that you just put the roll of wire, the heatshrink and the LED's in, and it will assemble them into the strings automatically. Even tests the LED's and aligns them correctly as well. Start up, and leave, and come back later to the pile in the output tray.
why do these companies think we need strobing Xmas lights... ive seen large outdoor strings with that option. what a great way to distract cars passing by your house, nothing could go wrong there.
Especially, there are some very nasty Xmas string lights that can randomly switch between the modes ... and even with blue LEDs 😆 ... Driving along ... no flicker or fading ... Suddenly switches to alternate blinking pattern ... oh sh*t Police! 😂
I have a string of 30m between the main house and the barn. Even if it is attached to a nylon wire, so it does not carry its own weight on a couple of poles, they last less of a year. I'd hate to have to dig a mains cable and have light posts on the pathway.
@@bigclivedotcom for any given individual led it's always going to be DC...with AC any one would be OFF half the time..unless the string is fitted with incandescent filament type lamps ...
@@bigclivedotcom dc can lead to faster corrosion ..but that's when current is flowing...rest of time it's atmospheric contamination induced.....to reduce such, for extended outdoor use...apply conformal coating/varnish/nail polish.. after thoroughly cleaning / defluxing soldered joints...
@@bigclivedotcom another way of explaining the same but now in this case(anti-parallel connection)..the reverse biased string should be able to withstand total reverse volts.applied..and one led fails short...then there's that much additional rev.volts on rest...making them more susceptible to earlier failure...
Ok, show of hands please. LOL How many people, when seeing first the tiny video thumbnail, first thought that Clive was cuddling a Star Trek Tribble? LOL
I get why they generally don't, but it would be awesome if they could wire these strings so every other light is opposite, rather than one whole half of the string.
These lights look like they're bundled up accordion style where the right and left sides of the bundle are every other one on the string. Hopefully that makes sense, I'm not completely sure myself 😂 If you have a big enough screen you can see the loops of wire among the LEDs going back and forth.
I'm still looking for a cheap timing ic that sets an output low after a set time. See this happen more often with such a crystal but can't figure out which IC it is and how it can possibly be programmed.
A CMOS 4060 has it's own RC or Xtal oscillator, and a 14bit counter so it can produce quite long delays, programmable by and'ing the proper outputs together. About ½€. A 40 year old chip, still going strong.
These days the 8pin micro is the king of special projects. Writing the code to do what you want is not too hard and the chips have remarkably low idle current.
@@KallePihlajasaari for writing/ programming & testing code... one needs pc an latest compatible s w. ...interface modules compatible chips ..wiring& soldering h.w. too... With ( the still available!!!)discrete 60 yr.old logic h.w...only wiring& soldering h.w. is reqd.
Oh for the days (about 10 years ago) when we had 3 and 4 channel Christmas lights instead of these 2 channel ones just driven back to back, you got far more interesting colour patterns!
I've got a little USB powered 'intelligent LED' string.
Comes with IR remote.
good colours and patterns
O for the days, about 20, or 30, years ago....
@@idjtoal 70 years ago hanging lighted candles on Christmas trees. Yes they actually did it with lots of house fires.
Chase that chased. Twinkle that twinkled. Aah, the days. Swap some with dropping capacitors and series inrush limiters and the rest will last for years, even if used every night.
i do like the mellow (and less harsh) feel of the coloured christmas lights, the filiment lights althought I have probably been conditioned to prefer them as thats what I first knew.
I think the term fairy lights is catching on in the US for those tiny strings of in-line grain of rice LEDs.
$8 - Nicely done, didn’t know about the H Bridge truth table. I have a project that needs to flip the polarity so this teardown is super helpful. Thanks! The $8 is a Twitter thing. 😊
L293D is a common dual H-Bridge chip, so is L298N.
Keep in mind that when using an H-bridge to alternate polarity with just a single rail supply you cannot ground the load as the load is driven between positive and ground but on alternate legs.
That's soo cute.
I can't believe they all light up with that small powerbank
But still it's dc and safe. Unlike the old Christmas lights which shock you from everywhere.
But I loved the non led old type of Christmas lights.
Christmas in Kerala isn't complete without dangerous 230V lights ...and of course fireworks
If keeping the last setting is really important for an application perhaps wiring the microcontroller power pins to a pair of AAA batteries (or a 3V coin cell?) with a diode in series will give it enough voltage to remember the last setting without turning the LEDs on.
The diode in series with the batteries will prevent charging the non-rechargeable batteries when USB power is available and provide voltage drop so that the LEDs do not light up powered by batteries, although they may light up for a while with fresh batteries until their voltage drops from 1.65V to 1.5V
Plain cardboard boxes might be boring to you, Clive but my cats just love them!
I always thought of Clive to secretly be a fairy leaving us nice presents in the form of entertaining and informative videos :D
I finally done it, I created a 30x35x60mm box to control these LED strips with wife approval status. ESP32 for effects, last preset storage, no annoying flashy effects, only the ones I like and PWM control, D24V5F5 for power supply to ESP32 and DRV8871 DC motor H-bridge driver to drive the LEDs and a button for preset selection and power off. Soldered all together and it worked... after I connected button to the correct pin.
It is getting closer and closer to that time of the year where we buy random Christmas tat. Its also my favourite time of year because the lights, the events and all...
Christmas is just around the corner.
Your beauty never ever scared me
Last year I revived few LED Christmas lights that had H-Bridge and controller in one chip. The chip was dead, I believe because I plugged it out and in too quick. I could not find a small suitable H-Bridge for up to 36V, so I bought massive H-Bridge in size of this whole controller, Arduino, buck converter, put them together and wrote a software with my own preferred patterns AND remember the last pattern. I liked my candle flickering effect the most. But controller was HUGE! I would love to minimize the design and still be able to use Arduino or ESP-32 for patterns, but a smaller H-Bridge and 36V->5V voltage regulator.
These lights would work for me as they have the H-Bridge, 5V already as input. I just would have to strip controller chip, replace it with Arduino and I would be able to reuse the button. Sadly we don't have this store around here.
clive its ok for the picture to swamp out or to flash
thats the clive experience after all
i know people ask you to tame the light and stuff but we would like to have the full experience ,that means we want to see the flashing the swamping out of picture and all the fumbling in between
a simple verbal warning is more than enough
if the product blinded you i also want to be blinded ,if its flashing i want to see it !! thats the full product's experience after all and thats what the product your taking apart provides
That is a weirdly high level of precision on that timer. I'd expect a "close enough" internal oscillator in the microcontroller, not a crystal. Would adding a beefy capacitor in parallel with the little one extend the memory lifespan by any useful amount? Minutes, rather than seconds?
I wrote some software for a PIC microcontroller for a daily timer that used the internal oscillator. The drift was way too much, and was affected by a falling battery voltage.
@@bigclivedotcom Oh, yeah, it's definitely not a good way to do a timer, but it is a cheap way, and I'm surprised they didn't go with the cheapest possible approach...
It's less about precision and more about power consumption. Microcontrollers often include very low power oscillators intended for real time clock use which can continue run whilst the rest of the micro is in a low power sleep state. Those crystals cost pennies since they are so widely used.
@@ParabolicLabs That's ironic, it used to be the other way round!
@@bigclivedotcom You had to keep track of time of day. This thing couldn't care less what time it is...
I grabbed a similar USB set, but it only has little 0603 LED chip in slightly milky blobs on several strings of wire in the same arrangement of alternating polarity. The driver unit also has an infrared decoder and comes with an RCU. In its low intensity draws just enough power to satisfy a generic power bank, but on ramping up and down modes can suddenly let it go dormant.
I've been unfolding and folding it back, and storing carefully, and it keeps just working. Haven't disassembled it: it works, so I don't have to trash/repurpose it; and Clive takes things to bits so we don't have to.
By now you must have the brightest house on the island! Keep working. Good luck! 👍
The bundle of lights all tied up, kind of reminds me of a fiber optic porcupine! 🤣
I don't mind auto off timers for energy saving purposes, but only if (and I stress the IF) they have an option to turn the timer function off. I have some air purifiers that I run on zigbee controlled timers, and they have a power saver function to turn them off after a couple of hours, which was super annoying with no way to customise it, and you had to press a momentary switch to turn them on... so I bypassed the timer by adding a tiny cheap switch on the back of the switch (inside the unit) that makes it think the button is constantly being pressed (which resets the timer so no auto off, and it makes it turn on automatically when the timer clicks on).
I love theses kind of lights I have a multicolor set just in time a last video before bed!
Got a question! I have a LLC quasi resonant PSU that I want to send to you to possibly do a video on. How would I get in contact with you to get a postal address etc? The reason I want to send it to you is I lowered the voltage and wanted to adjust it back up but it wouldn't. I replaced the potentiometer which was what I suspected had failed. This didn't fix it so I thought it could be good for you to do a video on to troubleshoot and do a PCB breakdown It's a 600w dual voltage model that was bought as 30v output. Let me know if your interested.
That symbol on the microcontroller looks very similar to the Expressive logo, makers of the ESP chip range. It think they do make simpler chips other than the ESP range of controllers, would have to be super cheap to find their way into these types of products though....
It indeed looks similar to the Espressif logo, but rotated 270 degrees (or 90° CCW). It perfectly could be though, because originally Espressif manufactures cheap chipsets for the Chinese gadget market and instantly became "Famous" when they introduced the ESP8266 WiFi chip, which was also usable to the hobbyist community.
Oh yeah! I knew that logo looked familiar!
I suspect Expressif are having their chips cloned by knock-off fabricators, just like everyone else. ☹️
Their simpler processors *are* competitively cheap in OEM quantities, though.
Would love to see a vid on How to Reverse a Schematic
Hi Clive , do you have a project to ADD Back light to your Multimeter (Micro processer based) ! Thank you !
The checkout counter at Aldi had a stack of multicolor 1M long LED tape reels for $3 so I got one. They use a Tuya app downloaded to a phone to talk to the controller by bluetooth. The app controls all the parallel RGB LEDS, color brightness,pattern change. The most fun a geek can have for $3. Unfortunately it can't be controlled without the app loading the pattern onto the controller, but then it runs on its own. I don't know if the app phones home to China. Tuya is a pretty big company.
I wonder if swapping the crystal for a higher frequency would make the full-white mode less flickery (or if the crystal is only used for the wakeup clock). Assuming we're not hitting chips limitations... and that having it automatically turn off and on at a much faster rate than the usual 8 hours on / 16 hours off is not a too annoying... which at some frequencies may lead it back to strobe-mode 😆
I remember having a Christmas light set with a similar design, it's tempting to try, just for shamelessly-useless fun!
It's flickery on camera, i bet you don't see it in person very much, especially not when it's just a little bit of added lighting.
Increasing the frequency is not ideal, as it will increase switching losses on the H-bridge IC. So the whole string will be less bright, and if you start pushing it, you can also burn the H-bridge. H-bridge off-time tuning can be somewhat fragile, so up to a point it works fine, but it doesn't take much until it shorts itself out and dies, you don't get a lot of warning from increased temperature before that happens.
You mentioned it being in the classic PIC12 layout, have you tried to read/write it as a PIC12 just to see if it is?
A lot of 8 pin microcontrollers have copied a standard power pin layout.
I had a similar set that ran off D cell batteries with 500 LEDs. Some of the connections at the pack broke loose and I decided to turn it on while troubleshooting. I actually got a nice zap from it, made my arm twitch and everything. Hooked up my multimeter and read 87 volts AC without the LEDs in circuit. Pretty surprising but I suppose they're running them in series pairs for efficiency.
Some of the early ones used standard LED strings and boosted the voltage.
Super video. I liked it. 👏👏👏
Most microcontrollers can run on an internal RC oscillator for non-communication applications.
This one must be so cheap that even with a crystal, it would be cheaper.
Using a half bridges is probably cheaper than a pair of pnp/npn discrete transistors.
Cheap tat NO SOS!! 🤣🤣 The rippel is a bit much for USB lights. Nice video 2x👍
It probably looks worse on camera than in person.
@@oasntet probably. 👍👍
LOL! 😂
Yeah, wot?! No SOS flashy function!
Oh why oh why do the chinese just love flashing lights...
Maybe it just matches their power system which flickers away all the time. "Everything normal here"
@@fredfred2363 LOL it might be that,, the mains power in China is about as stable as the dictator sorry Government 🤣🤣🤣🤣 or they might all be gay but then the LEDs would all be pink. 🤦♂ 👌
It'd be nice to be able to mod multi-function lights to be less obnoxious with their patterns, like those "police light" strobes being omitted, but personally I'd scrap the lot of the patterns and have a higher frequency steady-on that can be dimmed down if need be, kind of like how those high-viz jacket lights we all bought u pon mass could be dimmed, although their PWM frequency is still annoying to my eyes, but that's just me... :)
Rare to find writing on the 8 pin microcontroller. The logo on the chip looks like the one used by Espressif, the manufacturer of the ESP32.
Great job Clive.. keep up the great work mate.. 🤙🏼🇦🇺
With that very long string of LED light's, I'm surprise you don't get a slight voltage drop towards the end of the string
I think it was fed with positive at one end and negative at the other for better consistency.
I’ve a similar USB set from eBay, with thin wire and /the/ most gorgeous rainbow colours (they’re kind watercolour hues). But I wish they could be reprogrammed. There’s one particular shimmer they do that’s My Perfect Idea Of What Fairy Lights Should Look Like… that only happens during the Play All Programs function 😭
I guess I would use a logic analyzer to figure out the pattern, and then replicate that with a micro, maybe a pi pico. You can use the pi pico as a temporary logic analyzer too.
the addressable ones? in blobs on the wire? they are standard, you don't need to reverse it
They will almost certainly be a 3-pin WS2812 protocol LED. I think the only change I had to make with mine when programming on a rpi pico was to output GRB instead of RGB
I have a question for you. Do you know how can I operate this set of lights with a timer? Since it has Thad bottom to turn them on and off, the timer doesn't turn them on, I have to be turning them on al the time. Very irritated, ohh, and by the way, my doesn't have a control remote just usb with the bottom tu turn them on and off and to switch between modes, any help will be appreciated thank you
Nice video and would 3 volts AC light both sides?
It would, but with 50/60Hz there would be visible flicker.
It appears that the only features of the H- Bridge driver is to alternate the output polarity, since Hi-Z and L-L are not used. H-L => H-L and L-H => L-H. Doesn't this just mirror the input voltages? Aside from buffering the output voltage so as not to overdrive the PIC controller, why add the complexity of this chip (and the cost)?
i love you roasting the box for not being exciting
I have one of those annoying power banks that turns off if the current draw is low. Luckly, Mr Carlson has a fix for that - look for "Power Bank Stay Awake". A simple 555 circuit that is easy to build.
I hate this trend of 2 channel fairy lights, especially these inverting ones. There was a small period of time when manufacturers still made the boards with full 4 channels capability and only used 2 by cheaping out on transistors. I liked to upgrade those to 4 channels. Luckily I have the nerves to repair the old rice lights so I'm still sticking with those.
wow i had no idea isopropyl did that to glue. thats great to know!
I think having such a thing on 5V USB rather than mains is sooooo much less concerning on these super cheap Chinesium gadgets! More of that.
If you use two h-bridge can you make a 4 channel version like the classic function lights? Exe 1 and 3 on one and 2 and 4 on another
Love to be able to reprogram that microcontroller.... make it so it only does a nice crossfade... no need to save settings if there aren't any.
First off, I love the videos.... I have been following you from across the pond over in the land of Canuckistan. So... As I watch more and more of your videos, I get the impression that walking into your house would be like a time capsule to the 70's disco with all the flashy lights. For some reason while I was watching g this video I had the song "" YMCA"" ratteling through my head. Or, it could be the -30, -35 we have been having lol..
Take care. Hope I didn't rattle the cage. That was not the intent..🌳🌳😎🌳🌳
Comfortably numb and wonderful
As the only useful pattern is the static mode, I wouldn't bother with the MCU and just power the string with low voltage AC power supply.
Interesting, I have one of these and it has an unpopulated 8-pin spot that looks like where a NOR EEPROM would mount. I wonder if mine could be made to not forget it's settings by adding one.
I've added EEPROM chips successfully to other sets.
@@bigclivedotcom Oh neat. Do you remember what chip you used?
@@AngelaTheSephira 24C02N
I'm looking for a way to use a small section of fairy lights in a glass mason jar replacing the customary standard static led lights that usually comes with the top solar chip and battery. Accompanied with something like a ESP8266 that can receive receive and react to a sequence of patterns. To mimic a something like fireflies in a jar. I would prefer color leds but golden white would work.
You can get firefly LED strings where every second LED is a self flickering one. Quite hard to get decent ones though.
Hope we can program it to the stable on when it powers on !!
20,000 uF cap, + NTC, should fix the memory. 😆
Thanks Clive.
;)
Could you cut off the USB plug and run the lights on low voltage AC (with a resistor)? It would allow both halves of the LEDs to light and avoid the need for an H-bridge. I wonder if 50/60 Hertz would be sufficient for a "tolerable" level of flicker?
The flicker is very noticeable at 50/60 Hz. Although many older American strings did that.
I've got some lights with a controller which seems the same as this. The timer function is set for the lights to come on at 16:30. Then after just a few weeks it's coming on about 6 hours later. Drifts out alot.
I have a similar controller, the flashing patterns are the same but it has a remote.
I'm guessing the micro is a clone of the 12F683 PIC, of which there are many, as I discovered in the past.
I just bought a cheap (and nasty) mood light from Poundstretcher. A ring of 6 white LEDs and a ring of 3 RGB LEDs with internal controllers and a SPDT switch to select multicolour/white mode. Totally naff but I bought it as I wanted the enclosure. So I replaced the miserable innards with an ESP8266 board loaded with the WLED firmware hooked up to a ring of 12 Neopixels all controlled by an app on my phone. Now it actually deserves to be called a mood light. 😁
The only downside to this hacking is it now requires a 5V 1A PSU to power it instead of the 3 AAA batteries it used to use.
Was hoping to see you solder a smaller resistor to make it brighter
Did you see fran say schematic in a slow Scottish, Sean Connery, big Clive, impersonation... I nearly wet myself I was laughing so much
I didn't see that (yet).
The patterns are the same as the other generic lights, those patterns have existed for more than 15 years. I wish they made new ones
Stupid question from someone who finds your channel fascinating but is definitely not an electrical type person. Does the crystal actually have a crystal in it??
Yes it does. Engineered quartz.
Hey Clive have you seen the latest led lights in ALDI ? They have two retro sets that look like traditional fairy lights - Canterbury bells and Pickwick petal shades - they come in the full five colours including pink ❤ I love them and they look like the old lights from the 70’s and 80’s ❤
I got some here. By Noma? I just know they'll be a lot cheaper at Aldi.
@@bigclivedotcom ALDI are selling them sets of 100 lights for £15 . The box has ALDI branding but I checked online and they look like the Noma lights .
@@carlyonbay45 Ah. Mine cost £20 for a set of 50 locally. At first I thought it was new old stock until I saw the new UKCE symbol.
Is there an easy way to change these so that they *never* flash? Would it just need a complete replacement for the power supply? Where I work there are some people who can't stand any flashing lights on the Xmas tree.
Not when odd and even are connected with reverse polarity. You'd have to feed with AC, to get all on, but you could use a higher frequency.
@@LeifNelandDk Thanks. I've just rewatched the video and come to the same understanding.
I've been trying to find the simplest circuit that can alternate polarity at a fixed speed for static illumination.
@@bigclivedotcom Two transistor astable multivibrator connected to the existing H-bridge?
Replacing the controller with a cheap PIC might be even simpler.
I'm just curious what the hour rating is on those LEDs until you have to replace the whole string yeah. At least they're not embedded with your artificial tree. Those are a b**** to troubleshoot. I'm just saying
Christmas light strings seems to use the smallest LED chips available and often degrade noticeably over time.
@@bigclivedotcom I have a string in the greenhouse, after running for a year 24/7, a crude luxmeter on the phone showed as ¼ of a new.
The new runs at a timer/light sensor from dusk to midnight and dawn to 8. Timer and sensor probably uses more power than it saves, but the light lasts longer.
I’ve not seen so many on a usb before, could be handy for this years tree if they are waterproof
this could have an interesting effect if you wired it up with a bunch of those two lead bi color LEDs so itd be color changing back and forth etc
Do you have suggestions on how to fix the sub if broke??
The sub?
The past couple of years I've bought neopixels (addressable RGB LEDs) to fool around with. Twice I bought these mistaking them for addressable. They look alike, and ebay/aliexpress ads don't try very hard to be clear about which is which.
New Masked Singer performer - the Mystery Diode.
Hi, I got an led bulb that just blew up for no apparent reason. It seems completely shorted as it shut my circuit breaker off. If you're interested I can send it to you. But I don't know how to get in touch appart from comments
I have a very similar set thats RGB. Turns out they just use a standard WS2812 protocol and a rpi pico later I've got some lovely custom patterns all written up for them.
If you could hook up with a link or deeper description of where you got them I would ow you a beverage of your choice
@@briancihak8271 a lot of the ones from amazon are fine. Search RGB Christmas lights and any that have the USB power like this video and show the same LEDs in multiple colours, or have multiple colour remote, should be good. Check they're 3-wire too. Think I got a 10m set for about £11. Some are inline and flat, some are the style in the video above.
You will need to crack the plastic off the case to see which wire is which (usually silkscreened or easy to follow the power and ground from the USB socket), but after that just desolder the data pin and insert your own pico. The Pico 5v bus isn't technically rated for the amps that the strip will draw, but you can power the pico in parallel to create a single USB but be careful about back powering your PC when programming if you do this!
I wish China would sell just the h-bridge module and pic programmed just to make the alternating current. Have a bunch of dead xmas lights that would come back to life with a module like that.
Great idea! And if programmed with a PWM sinewave output, could be used as a driver. 👍🏻😀🇬🇧
To me hot melt glue looks more like some sort of inert plastic than "glue" that solvents can dissolve.
In fact in my experience even acetone doesn't do much to it.
Therefore I don't bother using IPA on it.
Instead I gently pry it apart with a small flathead screwdriver and when it's securing something against a smooth plastic surface it often comes off in a satisfying manner.
IPA or ethanol causes it to shrink slightly, making it easier to be removed. Polyethylene feels different.
methanol can help break the bound between hot-glue and a smooth surface. i do this alot and it works great. but if fragile things are hold by the hot-glue its better to use a heat gun (air) instead, not to rip or break things.
I've put nitro engines on Flite Test foamies before. Those airplanes are built using hot glue, and nitro engines burn primarily methanol(Nitromethane being a power adder). Raw fuel spills on exposed glue joints does de-chooch the hot glue quite readily.
Before I knew acetic acid dissolved hot melt glue I made my own custom kitchen LED fixtures out of a nice warm LED light hot melt glued into the enclosure. So oneday I was making pickle brine and the LED unit dropped out of the enclosure.
@@johnpossum556 🫢😄
@bigclivedotcom are you also getting these YT ads for the "nomad security camera", a 360° wifi cam that screws into e.g. a porch light bulb socket. Seems like a good idea, but what are the safety implications for running such a device off your light circuits (some countries do not have earth leakage protection on light circuits). Also the ad is giving heavy spam / scam vibes. Any chance for a vid?
Could you use a 555 timer to make the H-Bridge do its thing? I'd like it to run at >10 KHz as well to eliminate the flicker. Also, that diode, is it to drop the voltage to the MCU? I'd moved it to the MCU instead.
Should be possible with an extra transistor to invert the output because you need a Q and Q_ for the H-bridge.
We don't know what the voltage rating of the MCU and H-Bridge are. If they blow up at 5V then a diode to protect them from supplies with over-voltage is a cheap fix. Perhaps the silicon is sensitive to even slight reverse voltage and the diode would protect it.
The flicker is only visible in the camera. I measured some similar lights with an oscilloscope and they were moving at 200Hz.
@@DumahBrazorf and if one sees flicker that the camera has picked up..then there's definitely
Diode is for reverse polarity protection...on all electronic ckt. that would otherwise fail if connected wrongly.
@@analoghardwaretops3976 You can't connect this wrong, it uses a polarized plug.
"Trashy, delightful stuff..." -- well that about says it all, eh?
Ultimate hack for higher brightness lights on all the time...
Cut off the USB connector.
Connect a 3 to 5v mains transformer with a series resistor no lower than 4.7ohms (at least 1W rated).
Done.
Enjoy.
Noticeably flickery though.
great video thank you for the continued lessons and knowledge
I wanted to put some lights on something so I picked up a string of those blob LEDs on copper wire much to my surprise after I cut it they alternate.....
Unusual to see the timer function actually using a crystal reference. Usually they just cheap out and use a timing loop in the microcontroller.
Not for accurate timing turning on the same time every day. 0.1% deviation is 1½ minute, a RC oscillator is far more inaccurate, the light would turn on and off at any time after a few days
This one's xtal.based timer is an advantage for accuracy and reduced parts count . All uC. / uP work on crystal generated clocks/ Freq. references..be they external or built in...timing loops use these same references...as base.
I took a nice pair of dollar store lights and just added two resistors and a usb cable to replace the battery pack. I wanted to use the ubiquitous dollar store power bank to power them but then it turns out it has low current detection, so I ended up on a rabbit hole making a pulse generator out of a 555 to raise the current to above threshold every 24 seconds.... I can use them now, but due to the timing capacitor size vs current supplied I have to plug it in, wait for it to shut off, then plug it in again lol
Hmm, in my typical re-purpose everything way, my mind is drawn to that sci-fi look I want to achieve in my hobby room. I would take the controller, solder a row of 2 leg bi-colour LEDs mounted behind a diffuser to the outputs of said controller and gaze at the gentle flip-flopping and crossfading of the 2 colours from the LEDs :) Hopefully that would work lol
Yeah people say Im crazy but I dunno, I seem to see more than what it is in things and swing towards what it could be, if that makes sense. x
If the H bridge has - -, +- and -+ modes, they could’ve got three wires out of the circuit board (C1, C2 and +) and that would allow them to drive the lights at the same time without multiplexing between polarities. Basically pull C1 or C2 to the negative rail to turn either side on.
Only one polarity can be put out at a time.
Needs you to add in the third wire, and the machine they use is designed to use 2 wires only. Automatic machine that you just put the roll of wire, the heatshrink and the LED's in, and it will assemble them into the strings automatically. Even tests the LED's and aligns them correctly as well. Start up, and leave, and come back later to the pile in the output tray.
Then you don't need an H-bridge anymore, just use two mosfets to pull c1 and c2 down.
Do you keep all of the circuit photos?
Yes I do tend to archive them for a while as a reference.
I saw you on ahsens channel a bit back
Could be handy for power cuts.
why do these companies think we need strobing Xmas lights... ive seen large outdoor strings with that option.
what a great way to distract cars passing by your house, nothing could go wrong there.
Especially, there are some very nasty Xmas string lights that can randomly switch between the modes ... and even with blue LEDs 😆 ...
Driving along ... no flicker or fading ...
Suddenly switches to alternate blinking pattern ... oh sh*t Police! 😂
Awesome Video big clive
Hi Clive , I wish to engage with you, how can I contact you?
Me too...
I have a string of 30m between the main house and the barn.
Even if it is attached to a nylon wire, so it does not carry its own weight on a couple of poles, they last less of a year. I'd hate to have to dig a mains cable and have light posts on the pathway.
It's usually DC corrosion that affects this type of light. I've not tested if the use of AC for the flashing effects reduces that.
@@bigclivedotcom for any given individual led it's always going to be DC...with AC any one would be OFF half the time..unless the string is fitted with incandescent filament type lamps ...
@@bigclivedotcom dc can lead to faster corrosion ..but that's when current is flowing...rest of time it's atmospheric contamination induced.....to reduce such, for extended outdoor use...apply conformal coating/varnish/nail polish.. after thoroughly cleaning / defluxing soldered joints...
@@analoghardwaretops3976 The newer strings of LEDs use alternating polarity to control two alternating polarity sets of LEDs.
@@bigclivedotcom another way of explaining the same but now in this case(anti-parallel connection)..the reverse biased string should be able to withstand total reverse volts.applied..and one led fails short...then there's that much additional rev.volts on rest...making them more susceptible to earlier failure...
Can we program the chip !??
Only if it could be identified, was not one time programmable, and the programming hardware was available.
Ok, show of hands please. LOL
How many people, when seeing first the tiny video thumbnail, first thought that Clive was cuddling a
Star Trek Tribble?
LOL
What will happen if you plug that into the Hoppi,without the controller board ?
Kaboom.
Christmas would end with a bang.
@@bigclivedotcom Is there any chance we can persuade you to ditch the annoying flickering HOPI for the device JW uses? LPT200 or something similar.
Arghh! My guide dog’s eyes! - well I’m now blind😎
I get why they generally don't, but it would be awesome if they could wire these strings so every other light is opposite, rather than one whole half of the string.
These lights look like they're bundled up accordion style where the right and left sides of the bundle are every other one on the string. Hopefully that makes sense, I'm not completely sure myself 😂 If you have a big enough screen you can see the loops of wire among the LEDs going back and forth.
They're alternate polarity along the full string.
I'd rather have it as you propose, arriving with an obvious flip in the middle. That's where my splice goes to make it run on DC without the strobe.
I'm still looking for a cheap timing ic that sets an output low after a set time. See this happen more often with such a crystal but can't figure out which IC it is and how it can possibly be programmed.
A CMOS 4060 has it's own RC or Xtal oscillator, and a 14bit counter so it can produce quite long delays, programmable by and'ing the proper outputs together.
About ½€. A 40 year old chip, still going strong.
@@LeifNelandDk Thanks, I'll take a look
These days the 8pin micro is the king of special projects. Writing the code to do what you want is not too hard and the chips have remarkably low idle current.
@@KallePihlajasaari for writing/ programming & testing code... one needs pc an latest compatible s w. ...interface modules
compatible chips ..wiring& soldering h.w. too...
With ( the still available!!!)discrete 60 yr.old logic h.w...only wiring& soldering h.w. is reqd.
buy tiny addressable ones too, looks like this one... i almost hoped it was it
Clive, can you look at one of the scam(heats up room in 2 mins)heaters that is advertised all over my intertubes.
Already done that... See ruclips.net/video/sPnLnk35XsY/видео.html
@@cyclic2696 The one I'm seeing looks like it has a fire effect and it seems to be on every website adspace everywhere I go, very scammy/spammy
@@Dead1yM Clive has these videos.
Thanks
This would be more useful to me if it were a ferry light controller.
Thanks again, this is one I have been trying to hack & reconfigure for years now so I can use Morse code to send messages across my river 😀.