I waited until after my Disney vacation to really did into getting my backyard lights up, but now it’s time. This is a project I begin every June and which usually takes several days because inevitably some will need repairing. For example: the tiki torch lights, some of which are over ten years old now…way past their expected lifespan of just one season and next year buy new ones (these things are made Very cheaply), and I’m a fix instead of buy new kinda guy.

At the end of last season the diffuser in one of the older set of tiki lights just came apart in my hands as I took the light apart to get the batteries out. The diffuser is a cylindrical piece of translucent plastic that helps with the illusion that the flickering led bulbs inside of it are actually a torch flame, and the plastic it was made of became brittle over the years. It just fell apart when I took it off the lamp to get to the batteries. When that happened I made a mental note to replace it somehow next year.

So now it’s Next Year and I pick the lamp up out of its storage container and remember…oh yeah…I need to replace that. But with what? I could go to the hardware store and get a thin sheet of translucent plastic but heat bending it into a cylinder wasn’t something I wanted to get into unless there was no other way. I actually have experience doing that from the time I worked at a custom plastic fabrication shop.

So I’m thinking and thinking. I start looking through my spare parts but nothing good comes to mind. Then I remember I have bunches of semi transparent drafting paper I could easily cut and bend into the correct shape. Oh…but no…it’ll get wet and soggy when it rains. I thought about it some more. Oh yes…I have some clear urethane spray I can coat it with. Hopefully that keeps rain off the paper.

It won’t be a perfect solution because the one lamp will probably look a bit different from the other, but hopefully not too much different. I’ll give it a test tonight.

Eventually I’m going to want to replace the tiki lamps with newer ones that project a really convincing illusion of flickering flame, but I am stubborn. I think the way the lights I have now work is charming. One set has two amber led lights inside, only one of which flickers off and on and the effect is actually pretty convincing for something so simply done, which is why I really like these more than the newer ones that are projecting an image of a flame. I have always been a big fan of practical special effects over CGI.