How to Check Bulbs in Christmas Lights
Christmas lights look fantastic when they are working, but nothing is quite as frustrating as going to all the trouble of untangling a strand of Christmas lights and then discovering a bulb has gone out. You may be tempted to toss the strand of lights and buy a new one, but there are some things you can do to check the bulbs in Christmas lights before you give up. Does this Spark an idea?
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Instructions
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Look to see if one bulb is darker than the others. It rarely is that simple, but if you go down the line and spot one bulb with a darkened look and replacing it fixes your light strand, then consider yourself lucky.
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See if one of the bulbs is loose and wiggles. Some light strands have a security feature built-in to keep the whole strand from working if a bulb becomes loose or is missing. Other strands have an extra feature that will only cut off only the lights that are running on the same segment of line as the loose one, making it easier to find, but if you are checking a strand of net lights this will not help you very much and can get quite confusing.
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Try a Christmas light tester. This simple device removes the bulb from the socket and if the device lights it up, the bulb is okay and you move on to the test the next bulb in the strand. You then repeat this process until you find the burnt out bulb.
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Use a hum tracer. The hum tracer works by picking up the 60Hz 'hum' from a wire when it is connected to the "hot" side of an AC line. This allows you to test each socket until you reach one that does not hum, indicating the bad bulb. Since light strands have three wires, make sure you are testing the bulb line when looking for the light that does not work.
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Use the LightKeeper PRO device. Plug in the strand of lights, then touch the line with the LightKeeper PRO. The good lights come on and easily allow you to identify the burnt out one. If the device does not work with the particular strand you are trying to test, it also comes with a hum tracer as well and you can use that to test your bulbs.
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Tips & Warnings
Mark the bad bulbs when you find them. Use a small piece of masking tape to mark each bulb if you are replacing more than one.
Check the fuse on the light strand before you start testing all those little bulbs. You might discover it is the real culprit and save yourself a lot of trouble.
