One Way To Install Christmas Lights

Every Christmas season here, where it can be, and usually is, very cold in November & December,
one often hears the statement "I should have put the Christmas lights up earlier when it was warmer".
For what it is worth, here is my solution to the yearly task - put them up once, PERMANENTLY!
Now, when it is time to light up for Christmas each year, I simply have to turn them on.

My solution also solves several additional problems brought about by the handling of the lamps. First, most of us seem to prefer the bright and sparkly lamps that use a clear colored exterior film coating. Water, from melted snow that falls or blows on to warm lamps, will penetrate and loosen this film coating. When taking down and next putting lights up this film usually peals or flakes off and leaves one with partially bare, very poor looking lights. Second, as a lamp is used the filament becomes very brittle and fragile. Even if careful, many lamps will fail due to a broken filament and need replacement after the yearly handling. Since permanently installing several hundred Christmas lights, only 4 or 5 lamps fail and need replacement each year. Every 5 or 6 years all the lamps are replaced as they reach the end of their rated operational life and as lamp colors start to fade due to UV exposure from the sun.

This is how I permanently installed my Deck and Garage Christmas lights.

Wood strips were cut from spruce and fir 2 x various-width scraps. Then a jointer was used to true each strip and a thickness planner was used to make each strip 1-3/8" thick by the width required + 1/8". Multiple wood strips were then half-lapped and glued together to form one single strip of the required length. The strip for the garage soffit was nearly 30 feet long. Needless to say, a helper was required to lift this strip into place as it would have likely broken from its own weight plus the installed sockets and wiring if only supported at one point. Half-lapped glue joint imperfections were removed next as the assembled strip is thickness planed to 1-1/4" thick (length of lamp sockets) and to the required width. The strip width varied depending on where the strip was used. The strip width for the Deck/Christmas lights was made the same as the thickness as the deck roof 2x7 fascia so that, when finished, the lamp sockets would appear to have been installed within the edge of a 2x8. The strip width for the surface mounted strip under the garage soffit was 2". A router was used next to cut a 1/2" wide by 1/4" deep channel down the length of the wood strip, on the back side, to accommodate wiring. Then, even though lamp sockets are spaced every 12" on the wiring, the 7/8" holes for installing lamp sockets were located and drilled every 11-7/8" along the wood strip to provide the extra conductor length required where the wiring is split to accommodate mounting screws. Pilot holes were next located and drilled for mounting screws. Finally, a router was used to put a 1/4" radius on the 2 front side corners of the strip.

Lamp sockets were pressed into drilled holes and made flush, front and back side, with the strip. A hot glue gun with an 1/8" extension tube tip was then used to inject hot glue into each hole around lamp sockets to lock the sockets in place.
Surplus wiring length was accommodated by laying conductors in an "S" pattern within the wiring channel. Hot glue was used to keep the conductors in place.

At mounting screw locations the conductors were split and one conductor was run along each side of the wiring channel. The conductors were embedded in hot glue to keep each firmly in place and well away from the mounting screw location.

End Profile
of Wood Strip

Mounting screw
location close-up

Since the deck was built 10 years ago

Deck lights (Christmas lights at Christmas) had been
simply stapled up. But staples kept working loose,
the wires were unsightly and sockets, brittle from
exposure to the suns UV, were braking.

Now Neat & Tidy

The sockets and wiring appear to be installed
in the edge of a solid 2x8.

The house and garage soffit lights each have an on/off switch and a common dimmer. A third switch selects power from the
Christmas Lighting or the
Garage/Patio/Driveway Lighting Controller.

Three additional dimmers are for deck pot lights, deck fascia lights and additional deck/hot tub lights.