Starting to plan ahead for my Christmas themed section of my layout. Walthers has some good stuff in their catalog this month, but one thing that seems to be lacking is HO scale Christmas decorations, specifically lights!
I noticed the Walthers holiday catalog had Christmas lights on the buildings and it looked photoshopped on. I was just wondering if anyone has figured out a way to make a reasonable HO scale structure light display or christmas tree with lights in HO?
I found some rice lights but the string of them looks to be about the size of regular lights. Any ideas? Fibre optics? LED's?
Thanks!
Rob
I was so totally disappointed in that Walther's Christmas catalog with the christmas lights on the buildings on the cover.
The cover said something to the effect of "the only place to buy what you see here on the cover" or something to that effect. SO I hungrily searched the catalog and found the buildings but NOT the Christmas lights on the buildings! SO I searched fervently to see if the HO scale Christmas light strings were listed separately in the catalog. WRONG!!!!
I somehow expected from what the cover said to find to buy the buildings with the lights in HO scale attached, or to buy Christmas lights that were Ho scale. But NOT SO!
SO I figured they lied about what they said on the cover, and gave up. Here I thought someone had designed HO scale Christmas-size lights fo some kind, and didn't expect that they'd be cheap. But *alas*...
-G .
Just my thoughts, ideas, opinions and experiences. Others may vary.
HO and N Scale.
After long and careful thought, they have convinced me. I have come to the conclusion that they are right. The aliens did it.
I'm thinking one of those fiber optic 'christmas tree' decorations is the way to go - however, it will be pretty permanent so you need to accept that if you want to go ahead. Actually fiber & paint & light source also works...Basic concept: drill out holes in the building facade where you'd like the lights, thread the fiber optic thru them one-by-one, maybe melt the end of the fiber a bit to get a more rounded 'bulb' effect. This is nothing new, I saw articles about doing this back in the 1990s. If all you are using is white light and fiber, then coat the end of the fiber facing the bulb w/ some transulcent colored paint. If you want to, run a fuzz-free string colored green or black along the building facade from light to light to represent a power cord.If you are looking to wrap scale trees or a thin framework (like a trellis) with a string of lights (not just Christmas related, as many catering halls do this all year round to look nice at night) - well, that's a pretty good question - never did this, but could the fiber cladding be nicked at intervals - you will loss light, so the results may be dim as you travel away from the light source
A few years ago I bought my wife's Christmas layout a Busch 189-5410 Lighted Christmas tree. Works fine. Just checked and Walthers still lists it, on sale even, good thing.
It would be nice if someone made a tiny string of lights to decorate with, but....
Good luck,
Richard
Anybody know a good place to get a basic fibre optic starter kit?
On page 44 of the January Model Railroad Hobbyist Online Magazine there is an ad for a Fiber Optic Vendor, click it and you can order a free roll of fiber optic filament and a free sample kit of the companies other products, with no obligation to buy anything.
I've bought from the company and found their service to be great.
Fiber optics work great for car headlights too!
A Christmas light scaled down to HO size would be smaller than a pin head -- no one makes a bulb or LED that small, not even a surface mount LED. Fiber optics may be the only way to even come close.
While it's not to scale, I added colored rice bulbs to a Busch tree and put it on a flat car. Then powered with batteries. Painted the flat car white and covered the battery pack with wrapping paper. It may look a little toyish, but the kids really like it. I think Busch may actually make a tree with lights now. I tried fiber optics but it got more complicated.
I know it's been awhile since this thread was active, but this year I found a couple of products that might work for you. I found them in the custom floral department at my local Michaels store over the summer and in the Christmas lights section at both Michaels and Wal-Mart now that it's mid-October. The first one is a string of tiny 1-2 mm LED bulbs strung like regular Christmas lights but on a smaller scale. Here is an example: http://www.lightsforalloccasions.com/p-1197-wedding-rice-lights-battery-operated-5-foot-white-wire.aspx The other is another type of micro-light string with LEDs, but they look like little colored or clear blobs connecting 2 28-ish gauge wire. Here's a page with an example: http://www.lightsforalloccasions.com/p-3442-string-light-outdoor-battery-op-18-micro-led-fairy-lights-orange.aspx They both operate with a little battery pack. I think they would be perfect for the outsides of HO scale buildings or lit community Christmas trees (though a little fenagling may be required due to the length/diameter of the wire between the lights). It might be easier to drill holes for individual LEDs in the facades of your buildings and wire them all together. That may be what I end up doing, though mine will only ever be a Christmas layout.
I have always had excellent results with fiber optics. I used the Plastruct fiber optic cable
kevin