Well, ya know... if you used 100 Ohm 10W wirewound resistors, you'd cut down the wear & tear on the switches, and the caps would be discharged within a couple seconds. Since the wirewound resistors have some inductance, that would help to reduce the initial current through them.

 

I already have the parts, some I no longer need. Want a string of 8 lamps that can connect to 110VAC? I have 3.

I was designing for extreme conditions that this sucker will likely never see. At the moment I have a 12.6VAC 400ma transformer, and with luck a 3A 12.6VAC transformer in a couple of days.

When I get this well and truly finished I'll be posting it on the complete projects forum. Maybe I'll save some physics lab some trouble.

 

I was designing for extreme conditions that this sucker will likely never see

Wait until you forget and apply AC to the input (where did that bridge get off to?).

 

Yep, $20 on capacitors up as a stink bomb.

 

Thinking about that I've come up with a solution. A schottky diode across the inputs to prevent backwards connections.

I'll draw a schematic and post it in a few days.