2009 Misty Isle Ct Christmas Display
From d.e.w.e.y.c.o.o.t.e.r
[edit] Introduction
We’re in the planning stages of the 2009 display. We had 6 houses synchronized to music last year, and we’re looking to add more. Wanna be part of it? All it takes a controller for the lights, extension cords, a little network cable, and lights. We start setting up after Halloween and turn the lights on after Thanksgiving.
[edit] How it works
I have a computer in my garage that runs a program that generates the signals to turn lights on and off in time to the music. This signal goes out over a network cable. The network cable goes to a controller board. The controller reads the signal coming in and controls the lights as commanded. Another network cable is attached to the controller to carry the signal to the next controller.
This picture shows the computer (C) going to each controller (numbered). The green line represents the approximate path of the network cable. This represents how we ran the network last year, but this will probably completely change this year.
Once the signal hits the controller board, it knows which set of lights to turn on and when to do it. It can control the lights by fades, shimmer, and twinkle effects.
The audio is played by the computer as well. We put a FM transmitter in the headphone jack – this plays the audio over a low-power FM channel so people can hear it in their car.
We had about 12 or so songs in last year’s display – I’d like to add 3 or 4 more this year.
[edit] Equipment Required
All that is really required to add your house to the display is a controller board, lights, and extension cords. Each controller board can control 16 channels and can be plugged into the closest outlet. A channel is any group of lights – a string of lights in a tree, several strings along a fence line, or rope lights around the trunks of trees.
Additional equipment would include wire frames, piping, or other items needed to make mini trees, mega trees, etc.
We have been using D-Light AC-16 D-Lightcontrollers. These are currently priced at $121.95. Tax and shipping makes it about $135.
Lights and extension cords are where the price can vary. Assuming a setup of 8 mini trees and lights on the bushes, trees, and house, we have been using 30 strings of 100-ct lights (3 per mini tree, 3 per tree), a couple boxes of net lights for the bushes, and about 6 boxes of icicle lights for the roof, the cost for lights would be about $100. Extension cords for a basic setup would run around $50, probably less.
In all, you can expect to spend $250 to $300 to get set up the first year. It depends on how many lights and extension cords you already have, so it could really be as little as $150.
I picked up a ton of lights last year on clearance for about half price. I’ll be using quite a few for a new tree this year, but anything I don’t use can be used for your display – that could save up to half your light budget. Any lights that you already have can be used in your display.
[edit] Typical Lighting Scheme
Mini trees – these are the small trees that line the sidewalk. We set them up about every 3 or 4 feet. Each has a string of clear, red, and green lights. A group of 8 trees uses 10 channels: one channel per tree for clear, and a shared channel for red, and a shared channel for green (so we can control a single tree’s clear lights, but turning on the red lights turns all of them on). We can also share the reds/greens in with adjacent controllers so a group of 16 trees could use 18 channels (instead of 10 + 10). Controller A would handle all the red mini tree lights, controller B would handle all the green.
[edit] Live Oaks
The trees in our front yards are set up just like the mini trees: clear, red, and green. The equipment breakdown section assumed one string per tree for each color, but that makes it pretty sparse. Added 3 or 4 strings makes the tree look a lot fuller. Two trees uses 2 channels for clear, and shared channels for red and green (which can be shared with adjacent controllers again).
[edit] House
We usually put some sort of net lighting on the bushes and clear icicle lighting along the roofline. One channel for the bushes, one for the roofline.
[edit] Channels
Assuming that no shared channels exist, that’s 10 channels for the mini trees, 4 for the live oaks, and 2 for the house bringing the total to 16 channels. If we can split the reds and greens for the mini trees and live oaks, that would give an additional 2 channels to use.
[edit] Mega Trees
Mega trees are the 12 ft trees that we have between the houses. They provide a great effect but can be a little pricey. Each mega tree has 7 strings of clear, red, and green, and a star on top. Each clear string is a channel, red is one channel, green is one channel, and the star is one channel. (Red and green are often split). That comprises 10 channels (9 if red/green are split). We have been using fence rail as the main support pole and anchor the lights to a half circle of PVC on the ground. Assume $50 to $75 for the hardware for the mega tree. (Fence rail – 2 @ 10ft, PVC – 3 @ 8 ft, 2 @ 90 deg couplers, 4 @ 45 deg couplers, bun foot for top, hooks for hanging lights [7 on top and 14 on bottom], bolt for connecting fence rail, guy wires)
[edit] Sharing Channels
We often share channels in the display to save on the number of channels required. In the picture below, we have 2 configurations. The top config shows 2 controllers hooked up to 2 lines of red trees and 2 lines of green trees. The first controller controls its red and its green and uses 2 channels to do so. Same with the second controller. Total channel usage: 4 channels.
The bottom config shows the same lights, but the first controller controls all the red, and the second controller controls all the green. Total channel usage: 2 channels.
The only downside to doing this is that we can no longer only turn the red lights on for the first controller. Instead, we have to turn the red lights on for both controllers. Don’t worry if this doesn’t make sense.
[edit] Extension Cords
We make our own extension cords from reel of wire. Each cord is cut to length and the ends are put on. One male plug is attached to one end and as many female plugs as required are attached along the cord. A typical 16-channel display will use half a roll of wire.
[edit] Controllers
We have been using the D-Light ACx16 controller. Light-o-Rama also makes a comparable controller for about $40 more. Each controller is plugged into a nearby outlet, and 16 extension cords are attached to the controller (spade connectors on the lower left). The network cables connect to the jacks on the right side of the board. We put the board inside an enclosure to protect it from the elements.
[edit] 2008 Controller Locations
Controller Channels Location Description 1 16 Jones / Trevino mega tree J/T mega tree, Jones house, fence 2 8 Trevino front yard Trevino mini trees, trees, house 3 16 Mabe front yard Mabe mega tree, mini trees, trees, house 4 8 Jones / Trevino mail box J/T mailbox minitrees 5 8 Jones front yard J minitrees 6 8 Jones front yard J trees, yard, strobes 7 8 Montz / Jones mega tree M/J mega tree 8 8 Montz front yard Montz’s mini trees, trees, house 9 16 Dodson front yard Dodson’s mini trees, trees, house, sign 10 8 Arch Arch control 11 16 Frank front yard Frank’s mini trees, trees, house 120 Total
[edit] 2009
[edit] Status
[edit] Schedule
-- Complete --
November 1 - 4 Houses (Jones, Trevino, Dickinson, Connor
November 2 - Dodson house complete, mega tree poles set
Nov 7-8: complete houses, 3 of 4 mega trees out, begin natural trees
Nov 14-15: complete natural trees, new controller prep, monster tree
Nov 21-22: set out minis, run all wiring
Week of Nov 23 trouble shooting, live Nov 26
All work is complete - DMX went live with the D-Light network on 12/7. The only outstanding issue is controller 1D seems to be dead - correspondence with D-Light is in progress.
[edit] Plans
It looks like we’ll expand by another 4 houses (or more!). This should bring us up to 184 channels. If I end up with the super-mega tree, we’ll probably be flirting with 250 channels.
Monster tree – I’d like to build a huge mega tree between my house and Jason’s. My goal is to get a 36-ft tree, with 64 channels: 16 each of clear, red, green, AND BLUE!! Budget is the primary concern here as it will require 4 new controllers.
We’ll also split our display into 2 networks. This is really only a technical thing – anyone viewing the display won’t know any different – but what it really means is that we’ll have a network cable leaving my garage and going toward Jason’s. It will carry the signal for all controllers in that direction. Another network cable will go the other direction and hit all those controllers.
The advantages: • we can save in the amount of network cable used (no backtracking) • each cable can only “hold” so much data. As we add channels, we approach this saturation point. Splitting the networks buys us some time.
The only real disadvantages are that we need a new $30 widget for each network, and we’ll need to partially rerun some of the network cables that we already have cut to length – no biggee.
RDS – I bought a RDS controller, hopefully I can get it to work, though it should be overly crazy. For those with car radios that display the station and song information, we’ll be able broadcast our own radio station text.
Songs – I think we might steer a bit away from the rock music, maybe a bit more traditional. Let me know what you think. Here are a few songs that I’ve been tossing around as candidates to add:
| Jingle Bells | Emile Pandolfi |
| Mary's Boy Child | Boney M. |
| Don't Have White Christmasses in Houston | Branded |
| Music Box Dancer | DJ Schwede |
| Manha Manha (the muppets song) | |
| Jingle Bells | Bare Naked Ladies |
| Hark! The Herald Angels Sing | Jessica Simpson |
| Hippopotamus for Christmas | |
| Dueling Banjos | |
| Sandstorm | Da Rude |
Let me know if there’s anything that you think would be nice to put in the display. Programming – Programming the songs is definitely the biggest time sink in this project, and ** I welcome anyone with open arms ** who’d like to take a stab at it. The main thing is that we need to get the template set up – which means that we need to get the commitments in place (who’s in, how many controllers, etc). Then we can get the channel layouts defined, and the template in place. The going rule of thumb is that a typical song will take 4-6 hours to complete. I’ve been given the go ahead by guy who writes the software that I can share it with as many people as I’d like as long as we only use it for our display. So please, if you’re inclined to do some programming, let me know. It’s a lot like working with Excel (nudge, nudge, Felicity).
Seriously, let me know if you’d like to help. I’ll get you a copy of the software and give you a quick run through on how to use it.
[edit] 2009 Equipment Purchase
8 Controllers are on order - these will need to be soldered together and should be in around the Sept 1
Ext cord: 1000' for $130, plus vampire at about $0.60 each Novelty Lights as referred by Christmas in Kent, action lighting is $56 per 500' or $112 for 1000', vamps are 69 cents
2 Nov - Got two 1000' rolls for about $100 each and strobes at $5 per from Jeff Trykoski @ Illumimax. Ordered 17 bags @ 12 per bag female vampire plugs from ActionLighting. Still need spades: 64F for D-Light boards, 16M/F for moving controller 4 to 1
[edit] Northpoles
An idea that came up – stucco tape, 2” and 1” Northpole thread: http://forums.planetchristmas.com/showthread.php?t=12517 Would be good, one string of white lights poked thru, rest in globe…? 3” or 4” PVC, bulb on top, plug bulb and string in at top Concrete bottom 6”, bent rebar, sticks out 18”?
[edit] Important Dates
Sept 15 – I’d like to submit the order for new controllers by Sept 15. Things get busy in Oct/Nov, so we’ll be better off getting the order in sooner. The order for extension cords and extension cord ends should probably go in by the end of Sept. The amount of extension cord needed will depend on the number of controllers ordered. ** Please let me know if you’d like to order a controller by the first part of September – let’s target the 15th as the day for the money to be submitted and the order placed. **
Oct 31 – We’ll begin putting up the display on Sat, Oct 31. This gives us 4 weekends to work on it. The first weekend will be roof lights, the next 2 lights on the ground and trees, we run the extension cords and network cables the last weekend.
Nov 26 – Thanksgiving night. This is our target for the first show. We’ve been able to light up this night the last 3 years, but we’ve been getting bigger each year. Hopefully we can still hit it.
Jan 3 – We’ll start packing it up on Sun, Jan 3. The display comes down much faster than it goes up. We should be able to get everything down in a day.
[edit] Hanging Lights
Getting out the ladder and hanging off the roofs is not everyone’s cup of tea – luckily, there are a couple of us that can be talked into hanging the lights on your house. There usually 3 sure-fire ways to bribe us: beer, cookies, or beer & cookies – just try to get that request in early. Give Sam or myself a shout, we’ll get it knocked out.
We’re really looking forward to this year. I’ve only seen one other display that has done what we’re doing with multiple houses (and that’s been a couple years ago), so I really think we have something unique. Let me know if you have any questions.
Steve
[edit] Detailed Schedule
Oct 31 / Nov 1 – rooflines and mega trees
Nov7 / Nov 8 – finish rooflines & mega trees, natural trees, strobes, bushes
Nov 14 / Nov 15 – extension cords to new display boxes, construct new enclosures
Nov 21 / Nov 22 – mini trees, driveway covers, network cable, controller boxes, extension cords, signs, testing
[edit] Media Coverage
Each year, people suggest that we call the local TV or radio station and have them do a story on the display. I'd really like to discourage everyone from doing so. Traffic picks up a little more each year, and so far things have been tolerable. I'd like to keep it that way. With the additions to this year's display, I think we'll see a significant increase in the traffic the way it is, but if it gets on the 6:00 news, we might find ourselves wishing for things to be like they used to be.
[edit] How To
[edit] Mini Trees
Mini trees are made using lights, zip ties, and floral easels. Get a floral easel from Garden Ridge – they are about $1.50 or $2.00 each. We use 3 strings of lights per tree: 1 clear, 1 red, 1 green.
It’s helpful to label both plugs of each string of lights with W, R, or G to indicate the string is white, red, or green lights. When connecting the extension cords, this saves a bit of time.
Open the easel. You can optionally use a zip tie to hold the collapsing support in place to keep the easel open. Choose a leg to start on. This will be the leg that all strings start on. * Begin wrapping the lights by securing the light string to the starting leg of the easel with a zip tie. Start with the male end of the light string, and secure the string starting at the first light. Wrap the lights around the easel. Work your way up to the top. Each layer should be 2-4 inches apart. Don’t worry about getting it perfect, just try to keep the lights somewhat evenly spaced. Use zip ties if you need help keeping the lights from sliding. Once you reach the top, you should be about halfway through the lights. Use a zip tie to secure the top and work your way back down. When you reach the bottom, try to get the string to end at a leg other than the start leg. You can get creative once you get to the bottom by doubling back around a leg to get it to end right (as opposed to rewrapping). Wrap the remaining light strings. Be sure to start on the start leg and end on the end leg.
- Create half the mini trees with starting legs on the left and half with starting legs on the right (mirror image). See the image in the General Lighting Considerations for an example.
[edit] Mega Trees
Mega trees are 12-ft high trees with 7 vertical strings laid out in a semi-circle to resemble a Christmas tree. (Many people make these in a circle, but we can get away with making a semi-circle since people can’t see the tree from more than one side. This worked fine in the cul-de-sac, but we might look at changing it up for mega trees on the corner.) Each tree typically has had white, red, and green lights – 7 channels of white, 1 red, 1 green, and a star on top.
Determine the length in feet of the string of lights that you will be using (it’s best to use all the same brand, otherwise determine the shortest length). Not the string, but the length from the first light to the last. The height of your tree (above the PVC) in feet is equal to: (Length * Length) – 16, then get the square root
The rest of the instructions assume 12 ft. We’ve found this to be safe for the materials used. Anything taller should use different material.
The materials required to build a mega tree:
• PVC for the semi-circle base: 3 – 1 ¾” @ 8 ft, 2 – 1 ¾” 90° elbows, 4 – 1 ¾” 45° elbows • PVC glue • Fence railing for the main pole: 2 @ 10ft • Guy wire: 50-75 ft • Bun Foot (this is a furniture leg, about 6” in diameter, can be found at Home Depot in the wood trim dept) • 12” section of threaded pipe (with inner diameter to fit over fence rail) • Flange for threaded pipe • 21 small threaded hooks (to hold lights) • 3 – ¼” threaded eyelets • 12” piece of metal strapping (at least 1/8” thick) for mounting star (optional) • Rubber tool dip (found in paint department at Home Depot) • 3 Wood stakes and zip ties to secure the PVC to the ground • 3 Wood stakes to secure guy wires
[edit] Building the Mega Tree
Assemble the PVC to create a 8 ft diameter semi-circle. • 1 @ 8 ft, put a 90° elbow on each end • 3 @ ~40”, 2 @ ~20” to complete the circle with 45° elbows between. Dry fit to ensure a proper fit
Stack 2 pieces of fence rail. Cut to ~14’ (the tree should extend 12’ above the PVC, the rest is buried in the ground). You may optionally bolt the 2 pieces together.
Insert 14 hooks into PVC at about 45° to the ground. Space evenly around the circumference of the PVC. It helps to first layout the ends and 2 hooks in the front:
Then bisect the 2 sides:
Then put 2 more hooks between each of the 4 gaps:
Attach the flange to the screw side of the bun foot with wood screws. Attach 7 hooks in a semi-circle around the side of the bun foot. The lights will hang from these hooks. Drill pilot holes for the 3 threaded eyelets on the bottom of the bun foot next to the flange. Install eyelets. The guy wires will attach to these eyelets so keep in mind where you plan to install the guy wires because the assembly will rotate on top of the pole as needed.
Give the bun foot 3 coats of the rubber dip. Cover all exposed wood. Otherwise, the bun foot will split due to moisture and you’ll need to make another next season.
[edit] Assembling the Mega Tree
Determine the location for the tree. Put the PVC on the ground, long side away from the viewing location. Use the image below as a guide – it shows the mega tree when viewed from the top. The viewing location of the display is from below the image.
Install 3 wood stakes and attach to PVC with zip ties to secure the PVC to the ground. (blue squares) Install 2 stakes to secure guy wires. (purple squares) Attach one 12’ guy wire to each eyelet. Place bun foot assembly on end of fence rail. Place fence rail at the green circle, bury into ground so bottom of bun foot is 12 ft above PVC. Attach guy wires to stakes.
Install lights. Each string touches 3 hooks. It starts from the bottom secured to one hook, goes up to hook on the bun foot and gets secured to the neighboring hook back down on the PVC. White lights – start at 1, up to the first hook, down to 2. Next channel starts at 3, up to 2nd hook, down to 4. Repeat until all 7 channels are complete. Red lights – Start with the female end on 1, up to 1st hook, down to 2. Next string: female on 3, up to 2nd, down to 4. Female on 5, 3rd, 6. Female on 7, up to 4th, down to 8. Now start with female on 14, up to 7th, down to 13. Female on 12, up to 6th, down to 11. Female on 10, up to 5th, down to 9. Now you can hook the male & female neighbors together (just the reds!!) and you’ll end up with 2 males between 8 and 9. Stack these – they’ll get tied into the extension cord. Green lights – repeat the same procedure for red.
[edit] Driveway Crossings
Extension cords and network cables need to cross driveways. In order to keep them from getting run over and crushed (more of a consideration with the network cables), we’ve installed a pair of 1x2s on the driveway an inch or two apart, bundled the wires, and run them between the 1x2s. This has worked fine in the past, but is a bit of a clunky solution that may not even be needed. Alternatively, if there was a way to secure the wires and run them flat, side-by-side on the drive, that might be a better approach. However, it’s probably best not to leave vehicles parked on them. (The 1x2s helped in this regard since you could tell when you ran over them.) Thoughts? Ideas?
[edit] Strobes
Strobes make for a very cool effect during the display, just make sure you have an extra channel. They’re a bit pricey at $6.50 each, but if interested, we can put together an order with ChristmasLightShow.com – a good guy to order from with impeccable customer service
[edit] Controller Enclosures
The controllers are a significant expense to the display. It’s important to keep them protected from the elements as we tend to get a few days of rain in December, but also make sure that little hands can’t get to them and get shocked.
Last year, we built some enclosures from ¾” plywood – roughly 16” x 16” x 16” boxes – and painted and decorated them to look like presents. You can get 3 boxes from a single piece of plywood that way. Use 2x2 stock to support from the inside and for the screws. We should still have paint left over (red, green, and yellow). Felicity put bows on last year.
Holes were cut in the bottom of the enclosures to allow the cords to run through, and the controllers themselves were put into small plastic containers (about the size of shoe boxes) to further protect them from moisture.
[edit] General Lighting Considerations
Try not to put more than 3 or 4 lights together end-to-end. Lots of people get away with more, but you run a greater risk of blowing the fuses in the strings. We’ve tried to stick with this rule and haven’t had any problems with fuses yet. End-to-end is not the same thing as stacking. Stacked plugs don’t have this limitation.
Try to minimize the number of vampire plugs required. This rule works closely with the end-to-end rule. Take a line of 8 mini trees, for example. Remember that the white lights all have their own channel, so 8 extension cords have to be run to control each channel – no getting around that. The red lights are all on one channel, and the green lights are all on another. We can actually power the red lights in all 8 trees with one extension cord end. In the image below, you can see that we can take the 4 trees on the left and connect the lights end-to-end. Then we can do the same with the 4 trees on the right. Both sides can then be plugged into a single vampire plug by stacking them. Instead of using 8 individual vampire plugs, we’ve only used one (and saved $7). Note that the extension cord can continue on and power more lights on that channel.
The channels and controllers do have maximum loads (maximum number of strings) that they can power. I don’t remember what the limitation is off the top of my head. The controllers do have heat sinks to help dissipate the heat generated, but some still get too hot to touch. This really only becomes a consideration when powering many strings on the same channel, using higher power incandescent (like C5s or C7s), or when powering lots of lights on the same controller. For the most part, this shouldn’t matter. I know that we have a couple controllers that power 2300 lights on a single channel (23 strings). That’s probably a bit much, hopefully we can keep that down to 1000 lights per channel or 10,000 per controller as a rule of thumb.
Rooflights – roof lights are pretty straightforward, but end-to-end considerations might need to be addressed. Start from the middle of the roof, work your way out to each side going end to end. Makes for the shortest run of extension cord and vampire.
[edit] Editing Songs
I generally like to keep songs to 3 minutes or less - I tend to get bored when parts of the song repeat over and over, and I guess I'm not creative enough to come up with new animation sequences for each repeat. A good (free) tool to use to edit audio is Audacity. With a little practice, you can trim out parts of songs and no one will be able to tell. Go to the Audacity Tutorial for more info.
[edit] Replace Sensitive GFIs
We try to run all the lights on GFI circuits. This is done for safety since these circuits can detect current leaks. However, GFIs tend to get more and more sensitive the more times they get tripped. A new GFI probably isn’t more then $10 or $15 and can be replaced in about 10 minutes. This might save us some grief this season.
[edit] Lighting Keyring
I’d like to put together a collection of house keys or garage openers. If someone has a tripped GFI or perhaps the computer needs to be restarted, we can take care of it instead of having to wait until people return home. Let me know if you’re comfortable doing this.
[edit] Cat5e
Solid, green 1000’ - $62 + $15 shipping, eBay is cheaper
[edit] Spades
Need to purchase male and female, bulk, see Mouser catalog We might look at running female spades of the board to males 12” outside. Makes for cheaper disconnect and easier storage of controllers.
[edit] LEDs
We don’t really have many LEDs in the display. Some people have had issues with LEDs in their display either not performing how they should, or just being defective. One guy I know spent $2k or $3k on defective LEDs. They are double or triple the cost of incandescent lights but require far less power. Use at your own risk.
[edit] Controller Basics / Set Up
Each controller gets assigned an address (ID) via the Hardware Utility. The works in conjunction with programming the light sequences – each channel in the sequencer is assigned a controller ID and channel number. When the “event” is sent by the computer, it includes the controller ID, channel, and event type (on, off, flicker, fade, etc). Each controller listens to the data coming across the cable. When it hears it’s ID, it routes the command to the appropriate channel.
All the data goes to every the controller in that network – so we if have 2 houses with the identical set up, we can assign their controllers the same ID, and they’ll behave the same way.
Wiring up a new controller – wiring up the controller is pretty easy. You’ll need: Main power cord and 6 female spades. The main power cord should be beefier than the extension cords since it carries current to all 16 extension cords for the controller. 16 short extension cords (30” or so) with 32 female spades and 32 male spades
Cut the female end off the main power cord. Then cut another 6” section off for the jumpers. Strip the jacket off the jumper section, then attach females to the ends of the black and white wires. Install jumpers. Attach females on the main power cord and install on the board.
Install 2 males on one end and 2 females on the other end of each extension cord. Install the females to the board.
Install the controller in its enclosure and route the extension cords out.
[edit] Hardware Utility, Addressing, Firmware
TODO
[edit] Troubleshooting and Diagnostics
TODO
[edit] DIY Extension Cords
Polarity, in-line females, Ridges on right, Black is hot, White is neutral TODO
[edit] Networks
We currently only have one network that runs to the Mabes’, back around to the Dodsons, then across the street to Frank’s. We really should add another network so we don’t hit the data limit and to save network cable. Here’s the proposal, would require an additional D-Light dongle.
Montz – 16 steve front 8 montz mega 8 montz front 32 dodson 16 conner 8 mailbox 8 steve house (16 jared) 96 (112) channels Trevino – 64 supermega 8 trevino front 16 mabe 16 mabe mega/mini 16 la fuente (16 tammy) (16 patrick) 120 (152) channels (16 saxon)
[edit] To Do / Notes
[edit] Tags for extension cords
- Will make things easier next year, make a plan for each controller that details channel assignments and cord tag numbers. - Jennifer suggested zip ties with plastic. If we get a sheet of plastic, it can be cut down. Use paper punch and sharpie.
[edit] Pricing and Ordering List
Controllers
We bought 3 @ $85 ea (DIY) + $50 dongle, 4 @ $135 ea (D-Light)
$845.00 total
$120.71 avg per controller
Cord approx 5 controllers per 1000
200' per controller
$65 for 1000' roll - I have 2000', hopefully we'll be on the light side
$13.00 per controller
Vampire These are the extension cord ends
~$8 per 12 (to be ordered)
each controller will need approx 32 female
$21.33 per controller
Insulated clips for connecting ext cord to controller
100 for $15 - each needs 16
$2.40
Extension cord for the controller
$5.00
$162.45 Total for controller
We may have some incidental expenses on top of this (enclosures, more extension cord, 1x2 for driveway, etc), but I don't expect any more than another $25 or so.
Strobes - I have strobes available for mega trees - 5 strobes for $30
For those making new mega trees, here's the official Mega tree BOM
15' of fence rail
guy wire
1 1/2" PVC x 24'
Elbows for PVC - 2 @ 90 deg, 4 @ 45 deg
Bun Foot
3 3/16" eyelets
21 1/8" hooks
7 100-ct clear mini lights
7 100-ct red mini lights
7 100-ct green mini lights
star for top (optional)
strobes (optional)
