How to wrap incans on Arches????

[sjb]

I am trying to wrap 100count incans onto the pvc to make some arches. My question is, I have to put 25' of lights onto 13" of pvc. Do you have any tricks or do they always look like a rat's nest when you wrap them on?

Thanks, Steve

[mitch09]

I used the sleeve method. I wrapped 100 count incans around sump pump drain hose. It was like 1 1/2" and looked similar to vacuum  hose. The little grooves provided a nice channel fir the wire. My sections were 14" long and I ran 7 of them on a 10' stuck of 3/4" sch20

[jnealand]

I'm about to trash my incan arches.  Already built my RGB arches.  If you were in the Atlanta area I would give them to you.  Here is one trick I learned after I built mine.  Start in the middle of the string and wrap pulling both ends around at the same time.  Good luck.

[bassmants]

I put dowels in both ends and made a "lathe" with my 1/2" drill chucked on one end.  The other I clamped a 2x4 with a hole in it to my saw horse.   Takes 2 people, but I finished a couple arches in about 15 minutes.

[zwiller]

I put dowels in both ends and made a "lathe" with my 1/2" drill chucked on one end.  The other I clamped a 2x4 with a hole in it to my saw horse.   Takes 2 people, but I finished a couple arches in about 15 minutes.

A couple in 15 minutes?!   "We were doing good until a strand broke loose and I lost a  finger..." 

No substitute to sitting down and using your hands (gloves!) making sure lights face up and winds are close together but not tight against pipe.  Make sure your are using the same lights for all of them.  Mark your pipe segments.  Zip tie the ends once wrapped and that's it.  From memory I used 10' 1" electrical pvc and got 14" from 100ct minis.  8 segments, that left 3" on each side for snow etc.  Takes a few trials to ID the target distance. 

[txag2008]

We did pretty well what zwiller explained.

Drilled a small hole through the pvc then ran a thick wire through both holes and bent it back into a chuck of our drill.  From there we could turn the PVC while the other person wrapped the lights tight.

Here are some pictures
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[sjb]

Thanks Guys.

txag2008, did you use 100 count as your lines are very neat or did you cut them to length?

We did pretty well what zwiller explained.

Drilled a small hole through the pvc then ran a thick wire through both holes and bent it back into a chuck of our drill.  From there we could turn the PVC while the other person wrapped the lights tight.

Here are some pictures
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[keitha43]

You can't cut mini incandescents to length. Just measure equal lengths for however many sections you want. I used 8. Some use an odd number . With an even number 2 segments can meet at the top(clap effect). With an odd number you have a top segment. You want to leave about 3-4 inches from each end to keep them out of water or snow. Mark the end of each segment with a sharpie. Wrap until the end of each segment. I used lamp cord to wire to the male end of each segment. Then covered that lamp cord with the next segment of lights. So eventually all male connections are at the end of the pipe to be hooked to the controller and you don't have a bunch of extension cords connecting along the arch of the pipe. If you reach the end of the segment and still have lights left just double back so that the male end stops at the segment end.

[txag2008]

txag2008, did you use 100 count as your lines are very neat or did you cut them to length?

We didn't cut them in making ours.  Like Keith said, you won't want to cut the incans. 

We used 10' long PVC and wrapped each 100light strands in a 14" area on the pipe.  We have 8 channels/arch with 4" of bare pipe on each end.  We zip-tied the beginning and end of each string and wrapped them as tightly as possible.

[Jeffl]

I have cheap harbor freight variable speed 1/2" drill mounted upside down on a saw hours connected to a foot switch and an apparatus in the chuck to hold one end of the pvc.  The other side has a piece of copper mounted to the saw hours to slide the 1" pvc over.

A picture would be nice but I can't find it. 

The one lesson I have learned with this method is that you can wrap them "too tight" and make the inside contact of the light socket pull out.  This makes for a pain to find the problem when 1/2 the string goes out.

[taybrynn]

I recall when making mine that I took a PVC cap and drilled a hole end and put a nut and bolt in it ... making into a pvc turner that I could insert into my drill like a drill bit.
Then I would zip tie one end and start spinning the lights on using the drill as the turning machine .. it worked well but took some skill to master.  At this point I would never do those style of arches, but if you have the lights they are nice looking but labor intensive to make at first.  It really helps to straighten the lights out before wrapping them onto something.  But removing the twists initially, but running your hand through them and letting the twists spin out ... those lights will behave much better when wrapped.

[fertsy]

I used the sleeve method. I wrapped 100 count incans around sump pump drain hose. It was like 1 1/2" and looked similar to vacuum  hose. The little grooves provided a nice channel fir the wire. My sections were 14" long and I ran 7 of them on a 10' stuck of 3/4" sch20

Agreed that this is the easiest way for set up, tear down, and storage. I used poly pipe for my sleeves. Can set the arches up in 10 mins if I get my rebar straight.


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[Gary]

I was thinking outside the box when planning my arches, and thought: "Why do I have to wrap the lights around the pole? People only see the lights from the front!"

So after I determined how wide each section/channel of my arch will be, what I did was made a jig out of a scrap piece of wood and 2 4" L-braces screwed into it spaced a bit less than my section width, wrapped the lights around that, and then neatly picked up the wrapped wires, placed them over the arch, and zip-tied them in place.

It still looks good and I saved money on lights in the process. Also, if there is a problem with a light string, I can easily remove and replace it in place.

[mkozik1]

I'm about to trash my incan arches.  Already built my RGB arches.  If you were in the Atlanta area I would give them to you.  Here is one trick I learned after I built mine.  Start in the middle of the string and wrap pulling both ends around at the same time.  Good luck.

How much do you want for them Jim?

[chrisatpsu]

my first year, i did incan arches.

i took  1/2" electrical conduit (the grey kind)
and taped a stripe every 12 inches.

i then made spt lines (with the female plugs)  to run down the pole for the 8 sections. (using a labeler to mark each spt cable by position on the arch (1-8)
then i just wrapped either 50cnt, or 100cnt (cant remember anymore) into each 12 inch section with the cord plugged into the spt cord.

then i took them outside and set them on the rebar i already placed in the ground, and wired up the expresses.