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How Do You Make A Lava Lamp?
Home » Gadgets » Lava Lamps » How Do You Make A Lava Lamp?Lava lamp recipes are so popular because coming up with exactly the right compound combination is an exciting chemistry puzzle. You won’t find any plans with the exact same material found in a commercial lamp, because this information is still considered top secret. It is a real trick finding two compounds that will form the free-floating globs you see in commercial lamps.
One of the simpler plans uses mineral oil as the globs and a combination of 70 percent and 90 percent rubbing alcohol as the surrounding liquid. The trick with these ingredients is to balance the two different grades of rubbing alcohol until you get a good balance between the alcohol’s density and the density of the oil.
You can color the globs by adding insoluble dye, such as the dye used in permanent markers. For best results, you should use a fairly tall glass container for the globe. For a safe and effective lava lamp, use should not use anything hotter than a 40 watt bulb to heat the globe.
Other homemade motion lamp designs use more complicated combinations of materials to create better displays. In most cases, acquiring all the necessary ingredients for building a lava lamp is actually more expensive than simply buying a commercial model.
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