[PSUscaper]

Just went on a estimate tonight and wanted to see if anyone might have some input. I have a potential client who owns a banquet facility and they want to do a great deal of lighting. I have the low voltage lighting pretty much under control but am trying to figure out something to do with the trees.

Besides uplighting and downlights, they want christmas lights strung in trees throughtout the garden areas. They had someone hang regular white christmas tree lights in the trees already and basically, they ALL stopped working. Some of the trees are 25' plus pear trees, large magnolias, and a lot of smaller 4-5" cal. trees.

This is a year round effect they are looking for, so standard string christmas lights aren't going to cut it. I'm trying to figure out what the best product may be for this application. The 'standard' off the shelf lights self destructed, and I would not even think about using them for a year around effect as they will never stay on.

I'm looking into rope lighting as it seems like it would be the most durable. I've found some other products, but not too familiar with.

I'm seeing if anyone has had experience with this type of lighting and could give me some insight on what direction to head. Its winter time, they want it done, and it would be a great job to past some time away with, so I'm looking to move on this one.

I'm keeping cost in mind, but, know its going to be quite expensive. I would say there's up to 30 strands of lights, average, maybe up to 100 in the larger trees already, and they all need to be replaced. I'm not even sure what the power consumption will be and what their current power system will support. They claim that all the trees were lit at one time, so I'm thinking they have adequate power supplies, but that will be another subject.........

This one could be very interesting.......

[Fine Edge]

Have you looked into some type of fiber optic lighting system. I've seen some that will enable a person to create a starry sky effect on a ceiling or wall, even a bottom of a pool. I think the fibers could be strung in trees with the same effect and probably require much less electricity.
Then , there's a color wheel, remote changers , etc...
If I have time tomorrow, I'll pull out some catalogs & let you know what I find. Or google fiber optic systems.

[nightscapespaul]

I would use LED Christmas lights for this one. The lights should last about 20,000 hours and they use very little power.

[4seasons]

I wouldn't use rope lights. If part goes out its more noticable than strand lights. I second what Paul said, but to go into it a little more--
Led lights are different color white( more pure) if that's what your looking for great, if not I found a company called GKI that has LEDS that are more traditional colored( called warm white). They are commercial grade but a bit pricey.
When wrapping, leave the lights loose enough for expansion. Fast growing trees will almost grow over the wire in one year! (found out at my house)
You can wrap each branch -- very time consuming
or
tornado wrap and let the strands sag a bit
90- 25ft strands with 50 mini lights equal almost 15amps( regular lights not LED).
you could do c-7's and just make sure the bulb hangs down( tie it somehow)250 c-7's pull 14 amps---300 c-7's pull 17 amps.

wrap your connections with electrical tape( not the cheap stuff either) water will get in and wreak havoc if you don't.
It'll look different now compared to summer, so good luck and have fun.

Bruce

[TNO]

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[LandArts]

I just put a strip of warm-white LEDs in for under-cabinet lighting in our kitchen. The other cabinet has halogen so it's easy to compare the light quality. The LED side looks very natural like a daylight bulb, the halogen side is very amber.

When the kinks get worked out warm-white LEDs could be great for landscape lighting.

[PSUscaper]

Thanks for the responses, but I decided to pass on this one...

I determined it just wasn't worth the headaches and the travel time to the job was too far for me to be making routine stop ins to work out any kinks.

On the subject however. I was thinking LED lights would be the way to go also, as they first use less power, second, last longer, and third, would be much more durable.

The problem with the regular strand lights is they tend to break or go out for the littlest reason.

The problem I had with the job was the price. Using LED lights would of been expensive.....and I mean expensive. For the scale of the project, I just couldn't see getting that kind of money and didn't want to get involved with a project with that kind of monetary value and that much risk. It seemed to risky. Plus, just too many unknowns as to what would be the time to put the lights in and mainly what would happen if some went out.

I think I'll leave this kind of job up to the people at Disney!