1st Attempt At A Mini Tree

[joatman66]

This is my first attempt at an idea I had for building mini trees.  It looks anemic with 200 lights, but another 200 might make a difference.

I'm not sure white is good color for the frame itself.

Any sage advice would be appreciated.

-Aaron


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[trekster]

Have you considered the tomato cages?  300-400 lights on them look good.

Ron

[joatman66]

Have you considered the tomato cages?  300-400 lights on them look good.

Ron

I haven't had any luck finding any cages locally...

I have easy access to coroplast, but it might be more work than necessary.

[rrowan]

I used pvc pipe, the tree frame will out live the lights and most likely me. after building my first one I tossed it across the yard and it bounced nice with no damage to it.

Rick R.

[inzeos]

They look nice in the coroplast.  How are you going to secure them to the ground?  My immediate concern would be that you have a lot of surface area for wind to hit.

[joatman66]

They look nice in the coroplast.  How are you going to secure them to the ground?  My immediate concern would be that you have a lot of surface area for wind to hit.

I basically made to triangles and slip jointed them to form the tree.  I also kerf cut along the edge for a place to slip the wires into so they won't sag.

For the "trunk" I took a piece of 1" PVC and slit it at 90 degrees and slid the 4 fins of the tree into it.  Sort of like the fletches on a dart.

My plan was to drive rebar into the ground and slide the PVC over them and maybe run a screw or two through the trunk to put enough friction on it so it would stay put.

I too am concerned about the amount of surface area making flying projectiles out of them...

Time being of the essence right now, I might scour the area for tomato cages.  Surely I can find an avid gardener that isn't using theirs.

-Aaron

[jnealand]

I would not worry about anemic.  My trees have 3 100 count strings each a different color.  At night with any one color on they look just fine.  However I do use floral wreaths and it is possible to see some of the light from the strings on the back where your tree would not allow any light from bulbs in the back to be seen.  We are our worst critics and our audience does not even care about this.  Besides with the lights being turned on and off who has time to check for anemia.  Now if those lights were always on then the audience may notice.  Light count on a small tree does not seem to make much difference but if you don't get enough lights on a big mega tree then it does make a difference.

[zwiller]

Couldn't agree more with Jim. Hopefully diyc gets back online as there is a wealth of info there. Zip tie gun if you plan on making more thAn one or two. Floral easels are also stackable!

[joatman66]

I ordered You are not allowed to view links. Register or Login to build mini trees. 

Are the plastic coated ones okay, or should I have stuck with the bare metal?

-Aaron

[Steve Gase]

I'd imagine plastic to be better (only more expensive and therefore use by fewer people).
With plastic you might have less risk of shorts, and maybe fewer rough soldering spots on the cage (which also might increase the likelihood of a short).

[holland lights]

I used one tomato cage on mine, then wraped chicken wire around it. Then i have 300 incandescents on them.

[chrisatpsu]

i found my tomato cages at big lots