On Wed, 21 Dec 2011 02:02:00 -0800, Jennifer Murphy
wrote:


That sounds right. Infinite resistance means the filament is broken and the
bulb is dead. You should be able to confirm that with a magnifying glass.
If they were run at double their rating, the filament damage should be very
obvious and might include blackening of the bulb's interior.

The filaments all look OK. A couple are somewhat blackened.

I like to flick the bulb with my finger. Often a filament is broken
but the gap is so small, I can't tell until I do that, but after that,
the filament vibrates for a couple seconds. If it vibrates, it's
broken.

I then took the good bulb and tried it in several sockets. After
fiddling with the button switches, I was able to get it to light in
several sockets. It was very dim.

You may also be experiencing problems with dirty switch contacts and dirty
or corroded bulb sockets. The center button connector of the socket should
be nice and shiny in each socket. I bet they're not.

The switches are definitely at least a little suspect. They are the
push-button type. They are a little loose in the housing and if I jiggle
them, the lights flicker. I can't see into the sockets, but the house

That makes it much harder, but if you measure the voltage anywhere,
and bought bulbs that will work with that voltage, the burnt out bulbs
are probably the only problem with most sockets.


has been stored in garages on the east coast (humid) for many years. I
might go get a mirror on a stick and see if I can see into the sockets.
But if they are corroded, there ma not be much I ca do without taking
the while thing apart, which is too much for this Christmas.

Do you have a pencil with an eraser or the top, or a ball point pen
with an ink eraser on the top? These are probably too big, right? but
you can use a knife to make the eraser part smaller Cut from the end
down, instead of the side in.

But don't do anything until your correct bulbs don't work. I live on
the east coast too, NYC and Baltimore and haven't had trouble with
socket corrosion.

When everything dries, I will try to get under the house and see if I
can get better readings.

I don't think you have to do a complete rewire - if it were 110VAC passing
through those wires you would have seen the bulb go supernova and possibly
pop. There's got to be a transformer somewhere.

Yes, I'm quite certain that it's not 110 and probably not AC.

That would mean batteries.

OTOH is the house plugged into the wall?

By getting the bulb to
light in several sockets you've conclusively proved they can not be wired in
series (in a chain like old Christmas lights where if one bulb went dead,
they all died). That's important to know.

Yep, I was glad to discover that.

Trace where the AC wires comes into the dollhouse and find the transformer
(apologies if you've already done this - I just started reading this
thread.). If it's well wired to the cord and the cord's in good shape, I
wouldn't rewire the unit. Switches can often be "decrudded" by operating
them a few dozen times to scrape off the oxidation.

The AC cord is one of those really old fabric-covered types.

So it IS plugged into the wall. In that case t here is probably a
transformer, not at the wall (that's a new idea) but attached to the
house or maybe in a little corner of the house, right where the wire
goes into the house. If the house is older than 1955? or so, I'd be
very surprised if there was anything to turn the AC to DC. (Even if
it's much newer) So why did you say abve that it's probalby not AC?

The place
where it goes into the base of the house is just a hole in the wood with
no fitting or stress relief. There is no obvious wear that I can see,
but it all seems a little unsafe to me.

I think the next step is to clean the sockets, cycle the switches, install
the replacement bulbs and take it from there.

I managed to get under the house. The whole bottom is covered and glued
shut. I'm starting to think that this wasn't that well made. I'm tempted
to cut the cord and go without lights for now.

Don't do that. Just unplug it. You'll have new ideas as the winter
goes on, and time to work on it, but if you cut the cord, you'll
probably never fix it.

I have an electric heater from 1947 with a cloth covered cord that is
in perfect condition. So is the heater itself. My mother bought it
to warm the bathroom when I was new-born. OTOH, I have seen old wire
whose insultation is crumbliing. You may want to cut off that part
that is crumbling, if any, but leave as much as possible so you don't
have to break into the house to add more cord if the cord at the hole
is good.

If the little girl really
gets into it (right now she's more into Buzz Lightyear), I'll consider
taking it apart and installing LEDs and a battery pack

Anyway, thanks for the thoughtful and patient help.