I would like to (with your help) replace the Dept 56 Snow Village White lights used to light the houses - change to a warmer glow and to a LED bulb
What do you suggest
Thanks
Enon49
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Dept 56 uses a C7 “night light” bulb. You can find warm white LED C7 bulbs in Lowe’s, Home Depot or Amazon and, probably, a number of other places.
If the base is E12 candelabra, you can get warm white LED bulbs here. I’ve replaced most of my C9 Christmas bulbs with the larger version and I like them.
It's a C7 bulb. I have lots of Dept 56 and have bought the C7 LED bulbs for them. They work great.
Here is one called Champagne Warm White and it is dimmable. https://www.ledholidaylighting...3EAYYBSABEgJotvD_BwE
To dim it, you would need to add an extension cord dimmer like the Lutron ones.
George
I have a lot of D56 CIC buildings on my layout and have changed to LEDs' in just about all of them. I have a few reasons for the change:
1) I don't want a lot of 110 VAC running around my layout due to shock and fire hazards.
2) I don't want to be a constantly replacing bulbs. The D56 filament bulbs don't have a long life compared to LEDs.
3) My layout if 10 x 20 and I want to keep the ampere draw under control.
Issues I've encountered:
1) D56 bulbs are E12 base, candelabra. Some LED E12 base profiles don't allow the LED bulb to screw completely into the socket preventing electrical contact. I had to enlarge to the socket "mouth" if you would, to permit the bulb to screw further into the socket.
2) Brightness, a judgement in the eye of the beholder. Different buildings may required different brightness.
3) Color Temperature, another eye of the beholder judgement
4) LED Bulb size. The LED bulb size obviously needs to fit through the hole in D56 buildings. All building holes are not equal.
5) Some buildings can only be powered by 110 VAC.
6) I just wanted to "plug-in" the buildings using the D56 cord provided. I installed 16 socket power strips under the layout. I drill holes large enough to pass the plug and just plug-in the buildings.
I power my D56 building LEDs with 12 VDC which I connect to the power strips. I've also have gotten rid of most of any power adapters by providing those unique voltages. Just a couple of buildings have their power management inside the building. For those I still provide 110 VAC. On a couple of buildings I gave up some functionality to avoid more wiring. The Times Tower would be an example. I light the Tower but didn't wire up lowering of the ball. Radio City I ran a couple of wires to stop the flashing. Empire State - you don't really need the button. Just keep cycling power until you have the antenna color you like.
