I bought a pre-lit tree a few weeks ago and it had been working just fine. The tree consists of the 3 parts. Over the weekend, I noticed the top part only had about half of its lights still lit. The box says that if a bulb is blown or even removed, that the rest of the strand should remain lit. Well this obviously is not the case because there is a single strand on the top portion and a little over half of those lights are not working now.
Fast forward to today - I started pulling each bulb that was not working and inserting a working bulb (that came from another strand on the same tree). After about the 15th try, I hit the bulb that was causing the issue, and the entire strand lit up again. The strange thing is that I noticed the bulb burns much brighter (and a little hotter) than any other bulbs on the same strand. After about 20 minutes, it blew out and I was back to the same problem. Therefore, I do not understand how a light in the middle of the strand can be that much brighter and burn out so fast when the others look fine. I tried replacing the bulb with the spares that came in the box, same effect after 15 to 20 minutes. Any idea as to what has happened to this particular socket? I looked down in the socket and it looks exactly the same as one that works normally. It ticks me off because I have a fully decorated tree and now experiencing a weird problem after it was working fine for several days and it hasn't been touched. Taking the tree down and back to the store would be a huge pain. Thanks for any suggestions.
Fast forward to today - I started pulling each bulb that was not working and inserting a working bulb (that came from another strand on the same tree). After about the 15th try, I hit the bulb that was causing the issue, and the entire strand lit up again. The strange thing is that I noticed the bulb burns much brighter (and a little hotter) than any other bulbs on the same strand. After about 20 minutes, it blew out and I was back to the same problem. Therefore, I do not understand how a light in the middle of the strand can be that much brighter and burn out so fast when the others look fine. I tried replacing the bulb with the spares that came in the box, same effect after 15 to 20 minutes. Any idea as to what has happened to this particular socket? I looked down in the socket and it looks exactly the same as one that works normally. It ticks me off because I have a fully decorated tree and now experiencing a weird problem after it was working fine for several days and it hasn't been touched. Taking the tree down and back to the store would be a huge pain. Thanks for any suggestions.