Driver Distraction

Hello everyone,

It's been a long time again since I've been on here. I hope everyone's doing well as we close out 2022. I haven't found many exciting lava lamps to buy of late and life for me has been pretty busy, so I haven't been able to log on for a long time, but yesterday I found a bit of a mystery and wanted to share it with you. I found this little guy in a local resale shop and I wondered if anyone here might be able to give me a bit more info about this. I'm afraid I'm not very knowledgeable about what Lava co. has been doing since moving its manufacturing to China. It is a Lava Brand "Auto Lava" glitter lamp that plugs into the cigarette lighter port, copyright 2005.

I have found precious little information about these things online. I found a Worthpoint entry for one whose packaging was in a little better condition than this one's, but I'm not a member there and can't see what it sold for. According to the original price sticker, they sold for around $7 new. The only other reference to it is a short YouTube video of someone running one and it seems to look pretty good, but it's in the dark and I can't even confirm whether it's the same brand or a different version. Someone in the comments section indicated they were sold on Amazon, but that was also 11 years ago.

It's almost like the internet wants to forget these exist and I can kind of understand why. I'm sure they'd be a terrible distraction sitting on the dash board and it wouldn't surprise me if some states made it illegal to run them while driving (they're probably better for tailgate parties and car shows). I just wanted to share this to see if anybody has any more information about its history and value. Until yesterday, I didn't even know these existed!

Thanks very much!

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Permalink Reply by Claude J on January 5, 2023 at 3:06pm

I had a pair of those in the back of my van
They worked ok and the vehicle motion helped
Nice collector piece
They were offered by lava lite in the 1990's

They also had a collapsable fan, flashlight, and vibrator (YES a vibrator!)