I purchased color changing LED lights at LOWES. These are the ones manufactured by GEMMY and comes with five 10 inch ornaments that change color. It seems to have an inline controller on the power cord along with a circuit board at each light cluster. Has anyone hacked into these things to control them with LOR controllers?
I ordered some of the icicles version online. I should receive them next week. Its going to be hack project number 3. My current plan is to start the hack in the middle of January 09.
The current way the lights are connected or programmed seems to allow only 5 colors; red, green, blue, white and purple. I don't see a reason 16 or 256 colors could not be "created" with the hack and a LOR controller(s).
After seeing some of the post left by firefly and LOR users, I know what problems might result with the gemmy lights. So the hack will be fun.
I'll be very interested to see what you can do with them!
If I remember correctly, someone had discovered that the sequences are actually stored on a chip in the light bulb themselves. The only thing the controller seems to do is start them in sync, and keep them from getting out of sync.
I've e-mailed Gemmy to see if they can give me any info as to how they actually function and with any luck maybe a schematic so I can modify them. The only similarities to the FireFly that I can see is that it uses red,blue and green LED's to create 7 colors. They sell some sort of timer control box which enables you to attach multiple strings to play in sync with preloaded songs or you can attach an mp3 player.
Maybe this is the thing that needs to be modified to work with LOR?
Rick
Last edited on Mon Dec 29th, 2008 11:37 pm by Rick Ouellet
I have four sets of the C-series bulbs. They were going great and looked very nice for about 3 weeks...then it started to go bad.
I noticed one night that one strand was not synced to the others. I unplugged the whole thing and it didn't seem to fix the issue. The bulbs are about 30 ft in the air in a tree, so getting to them without taking down the whole set up was an issue. So i just let it be. The next night the show started and that same string was completely dead....it wouldn't come on at all. I had contacted Gemmy and they told me they wouldn't replace them. After some persuasive talk with them I got them to say they would replace them at the end of the season. I noticed last night that the plastic bulbs themselves are completely full of water...at least the ones I can see. I need to take a look at this much more closely when I get them down next week, but so far it has become and issue.
You're just running them on their own right, you have no control of when they change color? That's probably what I will have to do for 2009.
Thanks for the heads up with the water problem, I will more than likely drill a few holes in the bottom of the balls to allow water to drain out. Each LED cluster inside the ball seams to be fairly well sealed from the elements.
Rick if you get schematics, could you please e-mail me a copy. Posting them on any chat board might upset Gemmy.
Just to clearfy, Gemmy makes a "controller box" that allowes you to sync your own lights to music using your MP3 player. This box is simular to the "Lights and Sounds of Christmas" made by GE. This controller box has no MP3 input and has been sold the past two years at Sears, Costco and Lowes. Gemmy ALSO makes several styles of "color changing" light strings. These light strings do not have any music input and just a small controller at the beginning of the light string.
I wonder if it's as simple as hooking up the pc sound output where the mp3 input is on the Gemmy controller. Here is a link to the box I'm talking about. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d0PXQdZqBKw
I don't see any reason why connecting up your computer audio output to the MP3 player input would not work. Try the "line out" connector on your computer first, before using the speaker output. Connecting the speaker output of the PC *might* damage the control box.
After viewing the YouTube video, I did not know that Gemmy made a timer and non timer versions of their control box.
Vic Fortenbach wrote: I don't see any reason why connecting up your computer audio output to the MP3 player input would not work. Try the "line out" connector on your computer first, before using the speaker output. Connecting the speaker output of the PC *might* damage the control box.
After viewing the YouTube video, I did not know that Gemmy made a timer and non timer versions of their control box.
Vic, Gemmy makes two timer controllers; one with sound and one without sound.
You're just running them on their own right, you have no control of when they change color? That's probably what I will have to do for 2009.
Thanks for the heads up with the water problem, I will more than likely drill a few holes in the bottom of the balls to allow water to drain out. Each LED cluster inside the ball seams to be fairly well sealed from the elements.
Rick
Rick...
No I am not controlling with anything other then the built in controller. They look great, but the water may eventually become a problem. I wasn't so concerned because it is operating on low voltage so I know its safe, but if they fill up they could get heavy and fall or freeze and crack the plastic. I will be sending back the broken set and drilling holes in the other ones when I take them down on Saturday.
