What could be more fun than bundling up to take a ride around town on your bike to check out all of the wonderful Christmas lights?
I can think of only one thing…doing so on your very own rolling display of Christmas lights.
Read on to check out a few ways to pull this off, and see if you can out-do the man in the video below…he’s hardcore.
There’s a couple of obvious hurdles to overcome when trying to string your bike with Christmas lights.
One is the issue of power consumption, and the other is the challenge found in keeping the lights and cords away from the moving parts.
The answer to the power problem can be found in 3 simple letters: LED.
Michael Bluejay’s battery guide has the best guide for rigging up Christmas lights on your bike…HANDS DOWN! In his guide he says (as many of us already know) LED Christmas lights use 90-98% less energy than conventional Christmas lights.
Whether you’re running your lights off of battery power or from an inverter, this means that you get longer run time out of your lights.
Michael says there are basically 3 ways to power Christmas lights on your bike.
- Buy a set already wired for DC.
- Use a device called an inverter which converts DC to AC.
- Rewire your Christmas lights to run off DC.
In his guide he shows you how to do all 3, so definitely check it out.
So how do you make sure the lights and cords stay out of the moving parts? That’s a pretty easy answer too…a little common sense and a whole bunch of zip ties.
Here’s a guy in Seattle that has taken Christmas light cycling to the extreme. Can you out-Christmas-light him?
Of course, if you didn’t want to sport Christmas lights on your bike as you ride around town, you could always just get a couple of friends to power your home’s Christmas lights with your bicycles, like they did with the Christmas tree in Copenhagen for the climate talks.
I think every little step toward living green is an awesome one… but eco-snobbery sucks! My goal is to help newbies learn the most important steps toward living green — individually and collectively. Personally, I strive to have as little impact as possible on Planet Earth while I'm here.
