Cloudy lamp

[thomas chambers]

Well my first foray into buying a lava lamp from an online source and i end up with a seriously cloudy lamp. Can just barely see my hand on the other side of the lamp. Was wondering what my best course of action would be. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.

[flashbak01]

Hello Everyone...New here and I just wanted to relay the solution I found and my personal notes to it. I recently received a Lava Lite from my daughter for Xmas from Amazon. The water was quite cloudy and I don't have the patience to do the cycling procedure. I used the following procedure from http://www.moltenmeditation.com/lava.htm. Here are my personal notes and the procedure worked great! I now have crystal clear water with blue lava following beautifully now. Here are my notes:
Notes for refurbishing Lava Lite:

a) Cool down lamp so all wax is hard and in the bottom of the lamp.
b) Remove cap, and slowly pour out all the cloudy liquid
c) Refill bottle with cool water rinsing multiple times (5-7). Note: Let the water flow
slowly down the side of the bottle not directly on top of the wax lava.
d) After you've completed the rinses fill the bottle with clean clear water up to 2 1/2 " below the top of
bottle
e) Add 3 small drops of clear dish detergent

I used a Pyrex measuring cup and filled it with 8oz of clean warm water. Add 4 tablespoons of Epsom salt to the water and stir vigorously until all salt is diluted into the water, and let water cool down to room temperature. Use an eye dropper to extract the mixture and slowly add the salt solution to the lava lamp (gently down the sides of the bottle). Around 13-15 halfway full droppers seemed to do the trick. Note: You want to add just enough solution to cause the lava to flow up to the top of the bottle. Once you get the balancing ratio correct replace the top cap.
Credit for this procedure goes to both Neural Network Instructor and Eddie George. And of course this great site! Also special thanks to the Molten Meditation site.

[flashbak01]

Well honestly, the whole procedure including balancing ratio's took me about and hour and a half. I wasn't about to pay the shipping cost back to Amazon to exchange the item. I just wanted a beautiful Lava Lite and now I have one! So all in all I'm happy to have learned the procedure. Full cost of repair was about $1.85. :)
Please note I forgot to add in the above instructions that after adding the 3 drops of dish detergent, place the globe back in the base, turn on the light, and let the lava reheat back to molton before adding the salt solution! I'd say let the lamp run for about 30 to 40 minutes before adding the salt solution.