Chinese LED garland diagram. How to fix a New Year's LED garland yourself. Diagram of a classical Chinese garland

This article offers an excellent selection of diagrams for New Year's garlands and other electronic toys for the New Year's interior, based on the principles of autonomous and economical power supply, as well as the simplicity and reliability of assembling amateur radio structures.

LEDs of various types are used as the main radio component emitting light in all garland circuits. First of all, this allows you to significantly reduce the consumption of the battery source, as well as achieve unique and unpredictable New Year's pictures on a magical night.

Children are very fond of interesting and unusual things, especially flashing lights, so to the delight of the little ones, I suggest assembling a fairly simple version of the mini garland scheme. A printed circuit board in the popular amateur radio format Sprint Layout is attached in the archive above.

The circuit consists of a clock pulse generator on a domestic digital chip DD1 type K155LA3, the “power” part is made of bipolar transistors VT1-VT4, you can use almost any n-p-n structures, even KT315, if you still have them of course. An LED load and “switches” on logic elements DD2-DD4 with RC circuits R5C2, R7C3 between them are connected to the Transistors to set the turn-on delay time of the three output semiconductors.

In general, “children's joy” works as follows: Pulses follow from the generator to DD1.2, then opens VT2, then C2 is charged and as soon as the voltage on it reaches the level of logical unit “1”, then the output of element DD1.3 will also be unit that opens VT3. With DD1.4 the work is similar. The switching frequency is adjusted by selecting C1. As a result, a feeling of running lights appears.

I bring to the attention of readers diagram of a simple New Year's flasher, which can be originally made in the shape of a cross as a souvenir for the Easter or Christmas holidays. The shape of the flasher can be easily changed and used as an element of illuminated advertising.

The schematic diagram is shown in the figure. The LEDs are arranged in the shape of a cross, the circuit is made using the K561LA7 microcircuit. A rectangular pulse generator with a frequency of about 1 Hz is assembled on elements DD1.1, DD1.2, C1, R1, the transistor switch VT1 provides the necessary current for the HL1 LEDs. . . HL10, capacitor C2 is necessary if you need a smooth increase and decrease in the brightness of the LEDs - this is more pleasing to the eye. The resistance of resistors R3... R6 is selected (270-620 Ohms) so that the LED glow level is the same. Switch SA1 can be used to turn the display off or on in continuous lighting mode.

In this scheme, the number of LEDs can be increased to 12, from which you can create various decorative geometric shapes. If you use imported LEDs such as AND123R, which have appeared on our radio markets, the brightness of the glow will increase significantly.

This simple scheme is thirty years old, but it works great every new year in our home. The circuit is powered by a parametric stabilizer based on a D814D zener diode. The master oscillator is made on a K176IE12 counter with a quartz resonator with a period of 1 second. The signal from the counter output goes to a decoder made on the K561IE8 microcircuit. Positive pulses from its outputs are sent through diodes to the KT315 transistor, and the thyristor opens.

For a softer and more comfortable cozy glow, it is better to use ordinary light bulbs, which with both branches fit into the bridge rectifier and light up at full intensity. At the moment when the thyristor opens, some of the lamps are bypassed and the rest begin to glow at full intensity - this must be taken into account. The transformer can be taken from an old TV.

The circuit has mains voltage isolation, and even if you accidentally touch the power wires of the lamps, no harm will happen.

I think everyone will recognize the circuit of this simple multivibrator for two channels on two transistors. There can be many LEDs in each arm. Well, why not a super simple New Year's flasher that can be assembled on a circuit board in 5 minutes.

And if you want to use three arms, you can recall from an electronics course a multivibrator circuit with three transistors.

A correctly assembled circuit starts working immediately. Supply voltage from 5 to 9 V. Flashing frequency, i.e. The pulse sequences are selected using capacitors. It is advisable to use low-power LEDs with the same parameters.

Let's look at several simple circuit implementations. The first diagram reproduces the effect of “running lights” for three garlands. The basis is a circuit of three inverters of the K555LN1 digital microcircuit. The circuit works in such a way that at any given time only one of the inverters has a signal; accordingly, only one of the three garlands lights up, and the next one lights up when the previous one goes out.

The second circuit also allows you to achieve the effect of “running” lights, but with the ability to regulate the speed of switching the garlands, using a rectangular pulse generator. The switching frequency of the garlands is changed using resistor R3.

Another version of the Christmas tree garland switch circuit is similar to the previous one, but is assembled on CMOS chips and the frequency is adjusted by resistor R2.

The circuit is used to control a Christmas tree garland. A thyristor control module is built on bipolar transistors VT1, VT2 and resistors R3-R6. The flash frequency of the garland can be adjusted within a wide range by changing the parameters of the resistances R1, R2 and capacitor C1.

Below are schematic diagrams and articles on the topic of “garland” on the radio electronics website and radio hobby website.

What is a “garland” and where is it used, schematic diagrams of homemade devices that relate to the term “garland”.

New Year's holidays come unexpectedly as always and bring with them a lot of pleasant troubles. It's time to think about gifts, first of all for children, set the table for adults, choose good music and be sure to put up a Christmas tree, which you can decorate so that the guests have fun and comfort. And the first thing to be hung on the tree is, of course, Christmas tree garlands. All other toys, as a rule, are hung after the garlands. Next we will talk about the design of a wide variety of different New Year's garlands - old and modern.

In ancient times, when there was no electricity and the New Year was already celebrated, special New Year's candles were lit on the tree. Such decoration was very fire hazardous. But these times have already passed, everyone began to use electric garlands.

These were ordinary small light bulbs from a flashlight or from the backlight of a dial in a radio, connected in series. Garlands from such light bulbs were made mainly by enthusiasts with their own hands. They just picked up a soldering iron, who, of course, knew how to use it, took the wire and light bulbs, and after a while the New Year's garland was already hanging on the tree.

Somewhat later, New Year's garlands began to be produced industrially. Small-sized lamp sockets of various designs and colored lampshades of various shapes were used. Sometimes the lampshades were made transparent, and the lamps themselves were painted.

Flashing lights and blinkers

But it’s somehow sad to calmly look at the glowing New Year’s garland; you want your soul to turn around. Apparently, this is facilitated by some kind of blinking of the garland. In general, a flashing garland attracts with its beauty, and even with the expectation of some miracle or surprise. If there are several garlands, then it is possible to get various lighting effects, for example, running fire, running shadow, running twos and threes, as well as many other interesting effects.

Once upon a time, such designs were developed by radio amateurs; these schemes were published in amateur radio magazines, usually in the November issues. But these magazines, in conditions of socialist mismanagement, arrived almost a whole month late, so for the New Year it was only possible to make last year’s flasher.

Microcircuits with a low degree of integration were used as the element base, primarily K155 and K561 and their varieties. As examples, we can cite a diagram from the magazine “Radio” No. 11, 2002.

The basis of the circuit is a DD2 counter of type K561IE16, which controls four LED garlands through switches on the DD3 chip and transistors VT4...VT7. The most interesting thing is that the UMS8-01 music synthesizer microcircuit is used as a master oscillator. Such microcircuits were once used for voicing children's toys and musical calls: they simply played the melodies recorded in them.

So, in this circuit, the output audio signal is also used to clock the counter. One can only guess what the pictures generated by the LEDs will look like against the background of this sound. Naturally, music also sounds through the speaker.

In the magazine “Radio” No. 11, 1995, a diagram was published called “Automatic smooth control of a garland” by A. Chumakov. The circuit provides alternate smooth ignition and extinguishing of the garland at a speed set by the control unit. The device diagram is shown in Figure 1.

Rice. 1. Scheme of the automatic garland smooth control

If you look closely, the circuit represents a triac power regulator made on a two-base transistor KT117A. Only the charging rate of the capacitor is changed not manually using a variable resistor, but by switching individual resistors using a counter - decoder K561IE8. For comparison, Figure 2 shows a diagram of a phase power regulator using a dual-base transistor KT117.

Rice. 2. Phase power regulator circuit

Microcontroller control of New Year's garland

As designs on microcontrollers appeared in amateur radio creativity, Christmas tree flashers, or as they are respectfully called “light effect machines,” also began to be developed on microcontrollers. The most exotic design was published in the magazine “Radio” No. 11, 2012, p. 37 under the title “A cell phone controls a Christmas tree garland”, author A. Pakhomov.

The design was based on a board from a faulty Chinese garland. The author writes that he was attracted by the originality of the output stage, controlled directly from the MK. He recalls those flashers that were built on K155 series microcircuits, powerful KU202 thyristors (there were simply no others), and in general, you could put a Christmas tree on such a flasher.

But here it was enough to change the controller on the faulty board, write a program with lighting effects and add some kind of control panel. This remote control became an old Siemens C60 phone that was lying around idle. The AT89C51 microcontroller was used as a controller. What came out of this is shown in Figure 3.

Rice. 3. Scheme of microcontroller control of a New Year's garland (click on the picture to enlarge)

Although this controller is already outdated and discontinued, it is one of the best developments from Intel, later produced by Atmel. Designs on this MK never freeze, they do not require a watchdog timer. The command system is so good that it still remains unchanged, despite the appearance of new models of the MSC-51 family.

Simple LED flasher

Just above the article by A. Pakhomov in the same magazine “Radio” No. 11, 2012, an article by I. Nechaev “From CFL parts. LED flasher for a New Year's toy." The circuit is made on a three-color LED and three symmetrical DB-3 dinistors “extracted” from boards from faulty energy-saving lamps.

Rice. 4. Scheme of a simple LED New Year's garland

Each channel of a three-color LED is controlled by its own relaxation oscillator assembled on a DB-3. Let's consider the operation of the circuit using the example of one channel, for example red.

Capacitor C1 through resistor R3 is charged from rectifier R1, VD1 to the breakdown voltage of dinistor VS1 (32V). As soon as the dinistor opens, capacitor C1 is discharged through the red element of the three-color LED, resistor R4, and dinistor VS1. Then the cycle repeats.

The red, green and blue elements of a three-color LED have their own generators and operate independently of each other. At the same time, the frequency of each generator is different from the other, so flashes occur with different periods. The structure is placed in a transparent case and can be used, for example, as a Christmas tree topper. If you add a white HL2 LED to the circuit, then color flashes will occur on a white background.

It would be possible to give many more descriptions of the designs of domestic radio amateurs, old or new, bad or good, but all of them were made in almost single copies. Modern stores are completely littered with electronics made in China. Even New Year’s garlands and those Chinese ones, besides, they don’t cost anything now.

Literally a year or two ago, such New Year's garlands were sold at a price of 100...200 rubles, and on the eve of the current 2014 New Year they are sold in stores called “Everything for thirty-eight.” The real price, somewhere in Mega, is one and a half to two rubles. Let's see what's hidden inside.

Chinese New Year garland controller

Outwardly everything looks very simple. A small plastic box with one button, into which a power cord with a plug goes in, and four garlands come out. When plugged into the socket, the garlands immediately begin to show all the lighting effects one by one. There are 8 of these effects in total, as indicated by the inscriptions under the button. At the touch of a button you can simply switch directly to the desired light pattern.

If you open the box, then everything inside is also quite simple, as shown in Figure 5.

Rice. 5. Chinese LED garland control board

Here you can see all the details. The microcontroller, as always, is made in the form of a drop of black compound, next to it is a control button, an electrolytic capacitor, a single diode and three output thyristors.

There is also room on the board for a fourth thyristor, and if you solder it, you get one more additional channel. In the controller, this channel is usually also stitched. Our Chinese friends just saved on one thyristor. Those who have ever opened such control units claim that in some boxes there are only two thyristors sealed. The economy must be economical! Ours, still a Soviet slogan.

Despite such small sizes, PCR406 thyristors have a reverse voltage of 400V and a forward current of 0.8A. If we assume that the load consumes only 25% of the maximum current, then at a voltage of 220V you can switch a power of 220 * 0.2 = 44 (W).

Figure 6 shows a printed circuit diagram, from which you can draw a circuit diagram, which has been done several times. Here you can look at the holes for the fourth thyristor, the one on which you saved.

Fig.6. Saving parts using the example of a Chinese garland

Savings also apply to the diode bridge: instead of four diodes, only one is used on this board. And everything else corresponds to the diagram shown in Figure 7.

Rice. 7

The mains voltage is rectified by the diode bridge VD1...VD4 and supplied through the quenching resistor R1 to pin 10 of the microcontroller. To smooth out the ripples of the rectified voltage, an electrolytic capacitor C1 is also connected here. The current consumption of the microcontroller is quite insignificant, so in the future, instead of a bridge of four diodes, the Chinese decided to make do with one.

A small note about increasing the reliability of the entire circuit as a whole. If you solder a zener diode with a stabilization voltage of 9...12V in parallel to capacitor C1, then the likelihood of failure of the MK or simply explosions of thyristors will decrease significantly.

Resistor R7, connected to pin 1 of the microcontroller directly from the network cable, deserves special attention. This is done to synchronize with the network in order to carry out phase control of power. This is exactly what works when the garland lamps smoothly light up or go out.

On the right side of the microcontroller there are thyristor control outputs and a control button, which was described above. The thyristors are turned on at the moment when a high level appears at the corresponding output of the MK, then the corresponding garland lights up.

Sometimes New Year's Eve requires high-power garlands, from several hundred watts and above. In this case, the considered circuit can be used as a “brain”; it is enough to simply supplement it with powerful triac switches. How to do this is shown in Figure 8.

Rice. 8. Scheme of a high-power New Year's garland

Here you should pay attention to the fact that the MK is powered from a separate source galvanically isolated from the network.

LED garlands

They use the same controller with one button, the same thyristors, only instead of light bulbs, the garlands are made up of LEDs of three or four colors. Each garland contains at least 20 LEDs with current-limiting resistors.

Moreover, the design of such a garland is simply a Chinese mystery: in the first half of the garland a resistor is soldered to each LED, and the remaining ten pieces are simply connected in series. Again, saving ten resistors at once.

This design can apparently be explained by production technology. For example, on one line the first half is assembled, which is with resistors, and on the other line without resistors. Then all that remains is to connect the two halves into one whole. But this is just a guess.

How to fix a Chinese garland: diagram. Chinese garland diagram

Dangerous Chinese garlands » Datagor Practical Electronics Magazine

Option one, classic

Option two, fashionable

Dear fellow citizens, I urge you to take seriously such a not serious, cheerful thing as a New Year's garland! Examine, try on, touch. It raises doubts - get away from sin. Happy and good New Year 2013 to everyone!

Igor Kotov (Datagor)

Russia, Siberia, Novokuznetsk

Founder, owner and chief editor of datagor.ru, Journal of Practical Electronics.

datagor.ru

Almost every family has a broken Chinese New Year garland that needs repair. December always comes and takes families by surprise, who just the day before decide to put up a New Year tree and decorate it with beautiful garlands.

As a rule, we find out that a Chinese garland needs repairs at the wrong moment. You don’t want to spend money on a new thing, but not everyone can repair a Chinese New Year’s miracle on their own.

Now we will look at how a simple Chinese garland with adjustable light frequency works, common faults, methods for troubleshooting and ways to eliminate them. In the article everything will be described in detail, clearly shown in photographs. Everything will be convenient for restoring its functionality on your own. Almost every person will be able to cope with such repairs.

Schemes of New Year's garlands

Serial connection of paws

First, let's look at the simplest scheme of a New Year's garland. This series connection of incandescent light bulbs was the most common scheme in the Soviet years. Every house had a similar garland.

In a series connection, all the light bulbs are connected in a chain, in a wire break, and connected to a power source, generator, home wiring, battery. In this case, the same current flows throughout the garland.

There was no smell of LEDs, of course. She was forced to blink by starters taken from fluorescent lamps at school. The starters were simply connected in a circuit, similar to light bulbs, in series.

A few words about starters and their meaning. This is a simple gas-discharge lamp placed in an aluminum, paper or plastic housing. For convenience, an inspection hole is made in the body.

It consists of two bimetallic electrodes, which, bending from the passing current, close and open the electrical circuit. After that, the New Year's tree garland began to blink quite quickly.

This scheme is very simple and convenient, but has a significant disadvantage. When one light bulb burns out, the electrical circuit is broken and the entire garland goes out.

Parallel connection

Modern Chinese Christmas tree garlands are included in a parallel electrical circuit. By doing this, they extend the service life of the garland and delay repairs for a long time.

The whole point is that when the bulbs in a Christmas tree garland are connected in parallel, the voltage remains the same on each element of the circuit. Which gives a lot of advantages, the main thing is that if any light bulb in the circuit burns out, it does not break and the garland continues to work. As for the current strength, it is different for each element of the circuit.

This scheme is the most common in home electrical wiring, due to its reliability, convenience and simplicity.

The main malfunctions of New Year's garlands

Let’s simulate the situation: you take out your Christmas tree decorations and New Year’s garlands from the closet, start decorating the tree, plug it into the power supply, and nothing happens. Disappointment and despair on the faces of your children, faith in New Year's magic disappears, the holiday was not a success.

It is still possible to fix everything, even if there is a delay of fifteen minutes before the chiming clock, using your own strength and a simple tool.

The garland shows no signs of activity at all. We look at the electrical plug, its integrity is called a device. To do this, we disassemble the control unit of the Chinese garland, and look at the contacts that come from the electrical plug.

We place the switch in the diode measurement, press one probe to any contact of the plug, and apply the second to the wire contact on the control unit board. If the device makes a squeaking sound, then the wire is working, if not, then it is broken. We do the same with the second contact. Both turned out to be intact, we look for the fault further, if one is broken, we change this part of the wire along with the plug, and turn it on again. It burns normally, we are happy, no, we search further.

A small addition, a control unit for the blinking cycles of the Chinese garland, is located on the wire, immediately after the plug. This is the green box with the button, by pressing which you change the frequency of the New Year's blinking.

How to check a garland light bulb

If the garland is made with a series connection of light bulbs, then most likely one of the lamps has burned out. The electrical circuit is open, and current can only flow through a closed circuit.

To restore the functionality of the Chinese New Year toy, you simply need to replace the damaged element. But first you need to check the light bulb, which is under suspicion.

You can check by external inspection; the easiest way is to find an incandescent coil in a glass vacuum cylinder. When current passes through the spiral, it begins to glow in the spectrum visible to our eyes. If it burns out, it will be visible to the naked eye.

You can check it with a tester; to do this, switch the switch to resistance measurement mode. We connect the probes to the electrodes of the incandescent lamp, and look at the display of the digital tester. The working light bulb from the garland should have a resistance, and quite a large one; if it is missing, then we change it.

You can check the light bulb from the garland using an adjustable power supply, whoever has one, of course. We connect the light bulb to the terminals, set the voltage to 1.5 volts, the spiral should heat up a little. You can add a little voltage, although one and a half volts is enough.

If all the light bulbs and the power cord with the electrical plug ring, everything is fine, but for some reason the garland does not work? We are looking for a wire break in the garland itself.

It’s a little simpler here, we set the tester to diode testing mode, put one probe at the beginning of the wire on the board itself, push the second one to the wire inside the socket where the light bulb was. We heard a squeak, which means the wire is intact, put the probe on the next wire in the base, and continue the procedure until the end of the New Year's garland.

Garland control unit repair

It happens that the control unit itself for blinking garlands is to blame, a possible malfunction, a simple separation of the wire from the board, as a result of a strong jerk or cold, poor-quality soldering, or other problems.

To troubleshoot the problem, you need to disassemble the plastic box with the control unit itself. On the reverse side there are two screws for a “plus” screwdriver, figured, unscrew them and carefully remove the board.

On the board we see a circuit consisting of elements, an electrolytic capacitor, two transistors, four diodes, and one miniature button. On the board there is an open-frame microcircuit that looks like a black drop, and a pair of resistors.

The capacitor in the Chinese garland control unit has an electrolyte installed, which means it has polarity and must be observed. On the board that I have, it has a rating of 10 microfarads, at 25 volts. Transistors PCR 406, if suddenly during the operation of the New Year's garland, one of the transistors exploded, most likely, the second one will be completely identical. Diodes, all four are marked, IN 4007, a very common diode, there will be no problems with replacement.

As for the packageless microcircuit, its nominal value is written on the reverse side, B - 803, although in most cases it is known only to the manufacturer.

Troubleshooting Christmas garland

Let's start repairing the control unit and the Chinese New Year garland. We solder all the contact points on the board, it happens that cold soldering is not noticeable to the eye, so we carry out normal soldering, everywhere.

The next step is to check the semiconductors, these are diodes and transistors. Their checking is carried out by a tester; the diodes should be checked in one direction, and practically not pass a signal in the opposite direction.

The transistors need to be unsoldered; for a more accurate check, we check them with a tester. We replace damaged parts with new ones or with known good parts suitable for repair.

Capacitor, resistors and mini button, just check for integrity. When tested, they should not show a short circuit or a complete lack of resistance.

If you have followed all the recommendations for repairing an electric garland, and it does not work. You can exclude this block from the diagram and connect the wires in a straight line. You can also completely change all the wires. Of course, this is long and labor-intensive, but for beginner radio amateurs it will be excellent practice.

energytik.net

How New Year's garlands are arranged - Articles about energy

The simplest version of a New Year's garland can be several light bulbs connected in series. If you give the light bulbs multi-colored colors and some kind of lighting effect, then such a New Year's garland will attract much more attention and create a festive mood. Various schemes for controlling New Year's garlands were published in radio magazines before the New Year.

The diagram of a New Year's garland with alternate smooth ignition and extinguishing of LEDs is shown in Figure 1 (author A. Chumakov). A distinctive feature of the circuit is that the control of the extinguishing and ignition speed is carried out by a separate control unit.

Picture 1

As microprocessors were introduced into amateur radio circuits, control of New Year's garlands was increasingly transferred to them. A. Pakhomov proposed a control circuit for a garland from a cell phone (Figure 2) in the magazine “Radio” No. 11, 2012. The circuit is based on a control board from a Chinese garland with a replaced AT89C51 controller. The cell phone serves as a control panel for the circuit.

Figure 2

A fairly simple design for an LED New Year’s garland was proposed by I. Nechaev (Radio magazine No. 11, 2012, Figure 3). Three-color RGB LED lamps are used as LEDs, each channel of which operates independently and is controlled by its own symmetrical DB-3 dinistor.

Figure 3

However, homemade New Year's garlands are already quite difficult to find anywhere. New Year's decorations from China have practically filled store shelves. The cost of such garlands is minimal, and the cost of time and money for making a New Year's garland yourself is much more serious. The management schemes for Chinese New Year garlands are very simple (Figure 4). A small plastic box contains a microcontroller (a drop of black compound), a control button, a capacitor, a diode and three output thyristors. The control scheme for Chinese New Year garlands has been slightly changed. Initially, the circuit (Figure 5) provided for the installation of four thyristors, but Chinese craftsmen save a little on the element base and even install two thyristors in some circuits. The only diode serves as a rectifier. It is worth noting that manufacturers from China often save on current-limiting resistors for LEDs.

Figure 4

Figure 5

It is worth noting one feature of the above diagram. Resistor R7 connected to the microcontroller (pin 1) is used to synchronize with the network. This allows for phase power control with smooth switching on and off of the LEDs. To switch between control programs (lighting effects), use a button, also connected to the microcontroller input.

The control circuit for a New Year's garland with a power of several hundred watts is shown in Figure 6. It is almost similar to the circuit discussed earlier, except that the microcontroller is powered by a separate power supply with galvanic isolation from the network.

Figure 6

ukrelektrik.com

CHRISTMAS GARLAND SCHEME

Schematic diagram of a Christmas tree garland on microcircuits

The microcircuits are powered by a parametric stabilizer on the D814D. The master oscillator is assembled on a K176IE12 with a quartz resonator with a period of 1 second. The signal from it goes to the K561IE8 decoder. Positive pulses are supplied through diodes to the control transistor KT315, as a result of which the thyristor opens.

There are plenty of LED garlands on sale, but for a softer and more festively cozy glow, it is better to use regular light bulbs. The garland lamps with both branches are connected to a bridge rectifier and burn at full intensity. At the moment the thyristor opens, some of the lamps are bypassed and the rest begin to glow at full intensity - this must be taken into account. The transformer is taken from a suitable household device.

Unlike most garlands from the store, this one is isolated according to the mains voltage, that is, if children accidentally touch the power wires of the lamps, nothing bad will happen, since they have a safe voltage. With respect, Nicholai.

elwo.ru

The month of December has arrived, and it is time to start decorating the apartment with all kinds of New Year's decorations, including garlands. Here I begin to remember that last year someone hooked through a Chinese LED garland and the torn wires shortened the board so that all that was left was to throw it away.

There are a huge number of similar situations, but most have the same result: the board with the programs burns out, but the groups of light bulbs or LEDs remain intact. It would be a pity to throw them away, but few people know how to use them. In this condition, the garland can lie for more than one year without repair. In this article I will tell you how I solved a similar problem. The test subject was a 100-LED Chinese LED garland, with four groups of 25 LEDs, respectively.

I did not set the task of super smart programmed blinking of the garland. I wanted the garland’s LEDs to not just glow boringly without any signs of “life,” but to wink playfully, setting a festive mood. Here I remembered the old, simple, proven Soviet scheme using a starter from fluorescent lamps. If you adapt it to LEDs, it will look like this.

To be able to use it, I had to do a little work with the groups of LEDs. After checking the connections of the groups, it turned out that they have the anodes of the outer LEDs connected to each other. And for a circuit with starters, it is necessary that voltage be supplied to the anode through a current-limiting resistor. Consequently, it was necessary to break the anode connection and solder groups of LEDs with cathodes.

I didn’t have a miniature case to house the circuit, so I had to cut the printed circuit board to fit the size of the case of the Chinese LED garland I was repairing myself. The diagram in *.lay format can be downloaded HERE. As you can see, all the parts are placed very compactly. During the operation of the LED garland, the resistors heat up, so for ventilation I had to make about 25-30 holes in the housing using a drill with a diameter of 1 mm.

A little about the details. Starters from fluorescent lamps can be used at either 220 or 127 volts. Only the blinking speed of the garland will depend on this. MLT-2 or five-watt resistors (but the latter are better), with a resistance of 15-20 kOhm. Diodes are designed to pass through the reverse current of the network - 1N4007 or any others that are designed for a current no less than that flowing in the circuit. They can be taken from the diode bridge of the LED garland if they remain intact. ATTENTION! All parts are under high voltage, take this into account when assembling and operating the circuit.

That's all. As you can see, repairing a New Year's garland with your own hands is not so difficult. I post a video with an example of how the repaired garland works below.

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How to fix a Chinese garland: diagram:: ashanet.ru

If on the eve of the New Year you unexpectedly discover that the old garland that has been decorating the Christmas tree for many years no longer works, you should not rush to buy a new one, because there is always a chance to repair it yourself. As a rule, such devices of Christmas tree lights are not such a complex design.

Therefore, if you carefully check the possible malfunctions, you won’t have to wonder how to fix a Chinese garland, the circuit of which is not difficult. So, if the contact wires in the garland come off, the light bulb burns out, or the mode switching is disrupted, then you should not throw it away. It is enough to use some effective tips.

The colors in the garland do not light up: what to do?

The most time-consuming breakdown is considered to be the one when the color change in the Chinese garland is disrupted. Even if the solution to the problem is simple, restoring the device to its previous state will not be easy. A malfunction of the color mode indicates that the light bulbs in the corresponding section have burned out.

Before proceeding directly with the repair, it is recommended to disassemble the cover of the switch, which acts as a control unit, and check the reliability of the connections, especially the contacts soldered to the board.

Repair of a Chinese garland: diagram

If at first glance there are no signs of breakdown, then we can confidently say that the light bulb has burned out. Modern Chinese garlands are designed in such a way that all light bulbs of the same color are connected in series. And if one of them burns out, the light on the entire electrical branch will go out. To fix the breakdown, you need to use the LED Chinese garland circuit.

First, you should cut the garland into two equal parts and ring both sections. Then similar actions should be performed with the non-working side - cut into two halves and check again. Similar actions are carried out until it is possible to determine which of the bulbs is non-working. It should be noted that this method is recommended to be used only if the Chinese electric garland, the circuit of which allows you to speed up the process, is not disassembled.

Fault detection methods

The process of restoring the functionality of the garland can be accelerated. To do this, you need to take a tester and attach needles to its ends instead of probes. Then, using them, sequentially punch through each section of the chain so that the needle passes to the current core. It is necessary to determine where the section resistance differs significantly. In this way, you can identify a breakdown and repair it much faster, without putting in a lot of effort.

As a rule, old Soviet garlands for the New Year tree are much more convenient in this regard than a Chinese garland. Their circuits are almost similar, but the design is noticeably different. In Soviet ones, light bulbs are screwed into sockets. Therefore, it is possible to determine which of them is in working condition, without a soldering iron and an ohmmeter, only by elimination. This method involves taking a working light source and screwing it into the sockets one by one. Another way to use a tester is to measure the resistance of each individual lamp until you can find the burnt one.

Before trying to repair the garland, it is recommended to check the integrity of the common wire. For accuracy, you can refer to the Chinese garland diagram. On one side of the board you can see 5 soldered wires, 4 of which are intended for glowing colors, and one is common. And if the common wire breaks, it must be soldered.

What to do if the light bulb does not turn on at all?

If, after studying the diagram of the Chinese Christmas tree garland, it was not possible to find the cause of its breakdown, it is recommended to make sure that the problem is not in the LEDs. In this case, you should check the control unit and power cord. First, you need to make sure that the cord is intact, since there is a possibility that it was broken, or the contact connections at the connection to the microcircuit were broken. Then you need to try to check the reliability of the soldering of the contact connections to the board. Of course, in order not to suffer, you can buy a new garland, however, if you want to repair the device, then you should act.

So, the control unit can be replaced with a starter from a 220 Volt fluorescent lamp. It is recommended to check the LED connections first. If the extreme elements of the groups are connected by anodes to each other, then you will need to redo the circuit and connect the LEDs with cathodes. The point is that the voltage to the anode to normalize the operation of the starter must be supplied through a 5-watt resistor, while the resistance is 15-20 kOhm. In addition, additional diodes will need to be included in the circuit, which will pass the reverse current of the network through them. This is how Chinese LED garlands are repaired at home.

As you can see, you will have to spend a lot of time and patience to repair the garland. Therefore, if it is not so expensive, it is recommended to simply replace it with a new one of better quality. It is important to note that if it is the LED that burns out, after which the operation of the entire section is disrupted, then the working element should be soldered in, strictly observing the polarity.

Light bulbs broke

If the light bulbs are broken and there is a desire to repair the device, then it is advisable to simply replace the damaged light source. It should be noted that replacement is carried out only with the power turned off to avoid electric shock. In such situations, you should pay tribute to unbreakable light bulbs, since you do not always have to deal with malfunctions.

So, if you find that the garland does not work, then you should try visually and using a tester to identify the problem area and cut it out. After which the working sections must be connected using special connectors. At this point the repair can be considered complete.

Finally

As a rule, breaking a garland before the New Year is not always pleasant, but it is quite possible to repair the old one or purchase a new one. It is important to remember that repairs require special knowledge, such as working with the circuit board and replacing light bulbs. Therefore, in order not to waste your nerves and time, it is recommended to buy a new New Year’s garland.

ashanet.ru

Repair and alteration of Christmas tree garland | Catalog of articles | KataStat.ru

Such Christmas tree garlands are widespread everywhere. They are quite cheap and just as unreliable. Next we will talk about cases when a small control unit with a board shown in the following photos burns out:

The initial diagram for turning on the garland looks something like this:

Scheme of a Chinese Christmas tree garland

I can’t vouch for the accuracy, since I haven’t checked either the conductivity of the transistors or whether they are transistors.

The transistors in the real circuit are clearly not simple bipolar ones, but for further modification this does not matter, since the chip (control circuit) usually burns out and all electronics become irreparable.

The first inclusion option involves paralleling all the garlands. Moreover, this can be done directly in the block. The four wires coming from the terminals of the transistors are connected to each other and to one of the wires of the circuit's power cable. The common wire, the fifth, not coming from the transistor, is connected to the second wire of the cable. The control circuit can be disabled by removing the diode and resistor. The final diagram should look like this:

When turned on this way, the light bulbs, of course, do not blink and at the same time get quite hot. Apparently, the original version is designed for pulsed operation and if turned on constantly, the garland will quickly fail. To limit the load, it is better to enable them differently:

Scheme of parallel-series connection of Chinese Christmas tree garlands The fifth wire “common” is insulated

In this case, it is better to get rid of the box. The fifth wire “common” is isolated. With this scheme, nothing heats up anymore, although it doesn’t blink. The light bulbs do not burn as brightly as in the previous version, but the garland itself becomes reliable and safe.

To make the light bulbs blink in the circuit, you can use a starter from the throttle circuits of the fluorescent lamps. Turn it on in series with the entire garland. When using one starter, the garland blinks sharply and irregularly. Therefore, it is better to use two starters connected to the gap between the two wires of the garland, as in the following diagram

This inclusion of cables makes lamp switching smooth. The colors seem to shimmer, it turns out that the two colors almost do not go out, only the brightness of the glow changes.

You can connect the starter to the garland wires without soldering using a single-core wire, for example, a cross-connector

At the end of the starter terminals, use a 1mm drill to drill small holes about 3mm deep. Cable cores stripped to 3 mm are inserted into the holes and the aluminum terminals are forcefully compressed with pliers.

Crimping of wires into aluminum terminals of the starter (can be soldered using a DSP)

A similar connection can be made by soldering, but for this you will have to use zinc-tin solder (ZTS). You can also use factory connectors from fluorescent lamps, but the dimensions of the switch housing will have to be doubled

The housing for the switch will have to be selected or a new one made, since two starters will not fit in the old box. In addition, the starter gets noticeably hot during operation and this must be taken into account when manufacturing the housing.

Do not forget that all elements of the circuit, both Chinese and homemade, are under life-threatening voltage when turned on, and work on assembling the circuit must be carried out after disconnecting from the power supply.

Catalog of articles: KataStat.ru

katastat.ru

New Year's holidays come unexpectedly as always and bring with them a lot of pleasant troubles. It's time to think about gifts, first of all for children, set the table for adults, choose good music and be sure to put up a Christmas tree, which you can decorate so that the guests have fun and comfort. And the first thing to be hung on the tree is, of course, Christmas tree garlands. All other toys, as a rule, are hung after the garlands. Next we will talk about the design of a wide variety of different New Year's garlands - old and modern.

In ancient times, when there was no electricity and the New Year was already celebrated, special New Year's candles were lit on the tree. Such decoration was very fire hazardous. But these times have already passed, everyone began to use electric garlands.

These were ordinary small light bulbs from a flashlight or from the backlight of a dial in a radio, connected in series. Garlands from such light bulbs were made mainly by enthusiasts with their own hands. They just picked up a soldering iron, who, of course, knew how to use it, took the wire and light bulbs, and after a while the New Year's garland was already hanging on the tree.

Somewhat later, New Year's garlands began to be produced industrially. Small-sized lamp sockets of various designs and colored lampshades of various shapes were used. Sometimes the lampshades were made transparent, and the lamps themselves were painted.

Flashing lights and blinkers

But it’s somehow sad to calmly look at the glowing New Year’s garland; you want your soul to turn around. Apparently, this is facilitated by some kind of blinking of the garland. In general, a flashing garland attracts with its beauty, and even with the expectation of some miracle or surprise. If there are several garlands, then it is possible to get various lighting effects, for example, running fire, running shadow, running twos and threes, as well as many other interesting effects.

Once upon a time, such designs were developed by radio amateurs; these schemes were published in amateur radio magazines, usually in the November issues. But these magazines, in conditions of socialist mismanagement, arrived almost a whole month late, so for the New Year it was only possible to make last year’s flasher.

Microcircuits with a low degree of integration were used as the element base, primarily K155 and K561 and their varieties. As examples, we can cite a diagram from the magazine “Radio” No. 11, 2002.

The basis of the circuit is a DD2 counter of type K561IE16, which controls four LED garlands through switches on the DD3 chip and transistors VT4...VT7. The most interesting thing is that the UMS8-01 music synthesizer microcircuit is used as a master oscillator. Such microcircuits were once used for voicing children's toys and musical calls: they simply played the melodies recorded in them.

So, in this circuit, the output audio signal is also used to clock the counter. One can only guess what the pictures generated by the LEDs will look like against the background of this sound. Naturally, music also sounds through the speaker.

In the magazine “Radio” No. 11, 1995, a diagram was published called “Automatic smooth control of a garland” by A. Chumakov. The circuit provides alternate smooth ignition and extinguishing of the garland at a speed set by the control unit. The device diagram is shown in Figure 1.

Figure 1. Scheme of the automatic garland smooth control

If you look closely, the circuit represents a triac power regulator made on a two-base transistor KT117A. Only the charging rate of the capacitor is changed not manually using a variable resistor, but by switching individual resistors using a counter - decoder K561IE8. For comparison, Figure 2 shows a diagram of a phase power regulator using a dual-base transistor KT117.

Figure 2.

Microcontroller control of New Year's garland

As designs on microcontrollers appeared in amateur radio creativity, Christmas tree flashers, or as they are respectfully called “light effect machines,” also began to be developed. The most exotic design was published in the magazine “Radio” No. 11, 2012, p. 37 under the title “Cell phone controls Christmas tree garland”, author A. Pakhomov.

The design was based on a board from a faulty Chinese garland. The author writes that he was attracted by the originality of the output stage, controlled directly from the MK. He recalls those flashers that were built on K155 series microcircuits, powerful KU202 thyristors (there were simply no others), and in general, you could put a Christmas tree on such a flasher.

But here it was enough to change the controller on the faulty board, write a program with lighting effects and add some kind of control panel. This remote control became an old Siemens C60 phone that was lying around idle. The AT89C51 microcontroller was used as a controller. What came out of this is shown in Figure 3.

Figure 3. Microcontroller circuit for controlling a New Year's garland (click on the picture to enlarge)

Although this controller is already outdated and discontinued, it is one of the best developments from Intel, later produced by Atmel. Designs on this MK never freeze, they do not require a watchdog timer. The command system is so good that it still remains unchanged, despite the appearance of new models of the MSC-51 family.

Simple LED flasher

Just above the article by A. Pakhomov in the same magazine “Radio” No. 11, 2012, an article by I. Nechaev “From CFL parts. LED flasher for a New Year's toy." The circuit is made on a three-color LED and three symmetrical DB-3 dinistors “extracted” from faulty boards.

Figure 4. Scheme of a simple LED New Year's garland

Each channel of a three-color LED is controlled by its own relaxation oscillator assembled on a DB-3. Let's consider the operation of the circuit using the example of one channel, for example red.

Capacitor C1 through resistor R3 is charged from rectifier R1, VD1 to the breakdown voltage of dinistor VS1 (32V). As soon as the dinistor opens, capacitor C1 is discharged through the red element of the three-color LED, resistor R4, and dinistor VS1. Then the cycle repeats.

The red, green and blue elements of a three-color LED have their own generators and operate independently of each other. At the same time, the frequency of each generator is different from the other, so flashes occur with different periods. The structure is placed in a transparent case and can be used, for example, as a Christmas tree topper. If you add a white HL2 LED to the circuit, then color flashes will occur on a white background.

It would be possible to give many more descriptions of the designs of domestic radio amateurs, old or new, bad or good, but all of them were made in almost single copies. Modern stores are completely littered with electronics made in China. Even New Year’s garlands and those Chinese ones, besides, they don’t cost anything now. Let's see what's hidden inside.

Chinese New Year garland controller

Outwardly everything looks very simple. A small plastic box with one button, into which a power cord with a plug goes in, and four garlands come out. When plugged into the socket, the garlands immediately begin to show all the lighting effects one by one. There are 8 of these effects in total, as indicated by the inscriptions under the button. At the touch of a button you can simply switch directly to the desired light pattern.

If you open the box, then everything inside is also quite simple, as shown in Figure 5.

Figure 5.

Here you can see all the details. The microcontroller, as always, is made in the form of a drop of black compound, next to it is a control button, a single diode and three output thyristors.

There is also room on the board for a fourth thyristor, and if you solder it, you get one more additional channel. In the controller, this channel is usually also stitched. Our Chinese friends just saved on one thyristor. Those who have ever opened such control units claim that in some boxes there are only two thyristors sealed. The economy must be economical! Ours, still a Soviet slogan.

Despite such small sizes, PCR406 thyristors have a reverse voltage of 400V and a forward current of 0.8A. If we assume that the load consumes only 25% of the maximum current, then at a voltage of 220V you can switch a power of 220 * 0.2 = 44 (W).

Figure 6 shows a printed circuit diagram, from which you can draw a circuit diagram, which has been done several times. Here you can look at the holes for the fourth thyristor, the one on which you saved.

Figure 6.

Savings also apply to the diode bridge: instead of four diodes, only one is used on this board. And everything else corresponds to the diagram shown in Figure 7.

Figure 7.

The mains voltage is rectified by the diode bridge VD1...VD4 and supplied through the quenching resistor R1 to pin 10 of the microcontroller. To smooth out the ripples of the rectified voltage, an electrolytic capacitor C1 is also connected here. The current consumption of the microcontroller is quite insignificant, so in the future, instead of a bridge of four diodes, the Chinese decided to make do with one.

A small note about increasing the reliability of the entire circuit as a whole. If you solder a zener diode with a stabilization voltage of 9...12V in parallel to capacitor C1, then the likelihood of microcontroller failure or simply thyristor explosions will decrease significantly.

Resistor R7, connected to pin 1 of the microcontroller directly from the network cable, deserves special attention. This is done to synchronize with the network in order to carry out phase control of power. This is exactly what works when the garland lamps smoothly light up or go out.

On the right side of the microcontroller there are thyristor control outputs and a control button, which was described above. The thyristors are turned on at the moment when a high level appears at the corresponding output of the MK, then the corresponding garland lights up.

Sometimes New Year's Eve requires high-power garlands, from several hundred watts and above. In this case, the considered circuit can be used as a “brain”; it is enough to simply supplement it with powerful triac switches. How to do this is shown in Figure 8.

Figure 8. Diagram of a high-power New Year’s garland (click on the picture to enlarge)

Here you should pay attention to the fact that the MK is powered from a separate source galvanically isolated from the network.

LED garlands

They use the same controller with one button, the same thyristors, only instead of light bulbs, the garlands are made up of LEDs of three or four colors. Each garland contains at least 20 LEDs with current-limiting resistors.

Moreover, the design of such a garland is simply a Chinese mystery: in the first half of the garland a resistor is soldered to each LED, and the remaining ten pieces are simply connected in series. Again, saving ten resistors at once.

This design can apparently be explained by production technology. For example, on one line the first half is assembled, which is with resistors, and on the other line without resistors. Then all that remains is to connect the two halves into one whole. But this is just a guess.

We can only hope that everything is fine with you, at least with the New Year's garlands. Therefore, decorate the Christmas tree, set the festive table, invite guests, and celebrate the New Year. Happy New Year, comrades, friends, gentlemen! This is what you like best.