On Sun, 18 Sep 2011 09:40:05 -0700 (PDT), Andy
wrote:

On Sep 18, 10:49 am, "
wrote:
On Sun, 18 Sep 2011 07:39:52 -0700 (PDT), Andy
wrote:



Andy writes:
I recently bought some blue LED nite lights from our local
Dollar Store ( for $1 USD each ) and find that , while they don't
give out as much light as the 5 or 7 watt nitelights I have been
using, they are perfectly adequate for keeping me from
stumping my toe on the dresser on the way to the
bathroom at 2 am......

They are advertised to draw only 0.4 watts ... That would
mean if plugged in 24 hours a day, they would cost me only
35 cents a year ( 10 cents per kwh ) . I kind of like that...

So I took one apart and made a schematic. The
limiting is done by a series capacitor.... I then fed the
network into a PSPICE simulator and checked out the
claim..... Truly, it uses only 0.4 watts of real power.....

I went back and bought a sackfull..... If anyone else has
experience with these items, please post your experience....

I've been using them (well, not from the dollar store) for three years. I
like them a lot. I have other colors, too.

Sure, the light is weird ( kind of cool, actually ) and it is
only useful if you have been in a dark room for a few minutes,
but that is nomally the case for our household.....

Andy in Eureka, P.E.

PS If anyone is interested, I can Email you
the schematic.....

Sure.

Andy replies:
The "reply to author" in my browser gives crap for your Email....

Delete all but one of the trailing 'z's (krw at att dot biz).

So, I can send it to you in a PSPICE schematics file, or I'll
write out a "descriptive" file in .txt for you to use.. But I need
to know where to send it ...

Don't have PSPICE but it might work in LTSPICE.