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The 2007 Leaping Lights Project

Leaping Lights! If you haven't seen them yet, you're in for a big treat. They are one of the highlights of our display! Leaping Lights (LL) consist of two 8 foot pieces of 3/4" PVC pipe coupled together to form one 16 foot arch. Then ten strings of mini-lights are wrapped around each arch and each string is powered independently. When connected to our Light-o-Rama controllers with some creative programming, the Leaping Lights appear to dance around as each segment is sequentially lit up. We'll have 8 of these arches in our display, with four pairs of colors. They are truly a sight to behold! This is one of Brandon's favorite display elements...

Because some of our LL arches will be in the driveway, we made some concrete bases and had some brackets fabricated to attach the arches to. The brackets screw into the concrete base for stability. Each base weighs about 50 pounds, and they do a good job of supporting the arch. The arch consists of two pieces of Schedule 40 PVC that are wrapped in lights. Each half of the arch has 5 sets of lights and electrical connections to our controllers.

One LL segment is 16 feet long, which is a little unwieldy when it comes to off-season storage. So our design consists of two individual 8 foot segments that are coupled together. The glued-on PVC threaded coupler is a nice solution because it helps to preserve the graceful arc of the LL arches. Once screwed together, we wrap a few feet of mini-lights around the joint so it looks continuously lit in operation. The coupler is definitely the key to the success to the LL arches, otherwise we'd be storing 16 foot pieces of PVC wrapped in lights. Aside from the length, those segments would weigh so much they would be difficult to manuever.

Running up each 8 foot segment of LL arch underneath the lighting wire wraps, there are 5 electrical wires that will connect to each string of mini-lights on the arch. This photo shows how one of those electrical connections are made on the arch. The plug from the string of mini-lights is connected to the source power socket and then cable-tied to the arch. When it is dark, these connections disappear and just the lights are visible.

Here is an example of what a Leaping Lights segment looks like with lights on. In this case, the lights are gold. You can see the density of the lights achieved by wrapping them around the PVC as tight as possible. It makes for a very beautiful full look when powered on. We'll have 8 separate LL arches (4 pairs), and each pair will be a different color. They'll be strategically placed within the display to great effect. You'll have to pay us a visit to see the Leaping Lights in person. They're a favorite of Brandon!

All 16 segments of our Leaping Lights arches will be stored suspended from the ceiling on home-made brackets as shown. Since the lights stick straight out, each arch is about 3" thick. So we constructed some wooden brackets out of 2x4 lumber and screwed them into the ceiling joists with lag bolts. It's much easier to store the arches this way than the full 16' length of an uncoupled arch!

Here is a photo of what a fully lit LL arch looks like as we were testing the arches recently. It took about 4 weekends to initially build all the parts necessary to string 16 eight foot arch segments and bases. We'll have arch pairs in Red, Green, Blue, and Clear. Please stop by when the lights are on this season and check out our Leaping Lights arches! They are a real beautiful addition to our display and a favorite of many of our visitors...