Mathmos: White wax / clear liquid - limited run!!!

[perishingtardis]

Mathmos are doing a limited run of Astro bottles with white wax and clear liquid.

FOR ONE DAY ONLY!!!! WEDNESDAY 1st JULY

LIMITED RUN OF ASTRO WHITE BOTTLES FOR ONE DAY ONLY!

Due to high demand from our collectors, we are offering Astro white bottles for one day only, next WEDNESDAY 1st JULY 2020.
You will have until midnight to place your order on our websites and then the listings will be removed and we will fill the amount of orders placed only. No exceptions. This is a great opportunity for owners of the discontinued Astro 3 in 1, to refurbish their lamp.

On this occasion, we’d also like to offer you the opportunity to vote in our poll as to whether you want Mathmos branded bottles or unbranded for this run only. Majority vote wins, we will not be filling two separate batches into branded and unbranded.

NB. White wax is known to discolour, so will not be classed as a fault. Avoid heat and sunlight where possible to get the most longevity from your white bottle.

[Lava_Head_UK]

Not sure if it will fit but the new Mathmos bottles now have a little lip around the base of the bottle so they sit much better on the bases now.

FET said:

Clarifying... Mathmos Astro and Schilling 16.3" Lava Lamp.... Same size bottle?   :-)

FET said:

Has anyone put a Mathmos bottle on a Schilling Lava Lamp base? The Mathmos base is 96mm at the top and Schilling base is closer to 107mm....  If the Mathmos bottle is a bit smaller, it may end up resting on the bulb in my Schilling base...

[Lava_Head_UK]

Hope the quality of your io was better than my 2

perishingtardis said:

Price has indeed been raised. Typical greedy Mathmos. It's a bit like when they said the price of the iO would come back down to £375 after Christmas. But it never did. (Luckily I got mine on first day at the £375!)

[Critter]

I have written (email) to the lady herself at Mathmos basically begging for that Glass Astro to be produced.  I did not get a response but I remain hopeful.  It seems to me that Mathmos could perhaps make some of these interesting concepts for production if they were to sell them as a pre-order like these white wax bottles.  Or perhaps sell the hardware components (sans bottle) as accessories.  They have had some clever prototypes to show over the past five years it is too bad nearly all did not make the cut.  

Johnny said:

i Agree Critter that glass base was amazing and the white bottle on it as well be worth doing, personaly i aint paying £14 on top of normal bottle just to get white wax , cant understand why its necessary to bump the price up as its " same wax and fluid minus the colouring dyes"  dont bite the hand that feeds you comes to mind

Critter said:

The price increase looks to be 44% not 30%.  But these are strange times we are in too and perhaps Mathmos needs to earn more to even stay afloat?  I do think it is nice that they are responding to customer wants too.  Now if they would only produce that glass based Astro lamp they teased us with 4-5 years back.  

[Alfred]

Imagine the Fluidium with a glass base!

All of Mathmos's recent designs seem to be somewhat safety-focused, with both the Neo and iO adding screw-down points to make sure the lamp can't tip over. I imagine that would be a bit hard to do in glass, plus now you have to worry about making sure nothing too bad happens when the whole lamp shatters.

[lampfancy]

I remember being under the impression that the fluidium had a frosted glass base when they were first launched and was a bit disappointed to discover that they were actually plastic.

But yes it would be nice if they would re-launch it with a glass base— better from an environmental perspective and would avoid the issues with heat damage/ plastic degradation (which apparently was a factor in them being discontinued)

[Critter]

I would think that if a glass base and cap were made of borosilicate glass (like the bottles are)  there would no real issue from shattering due to heat differentials.  The only breakage that would occur would be due to impact and that could happen to a Lava bottle too.  If Mathmos were that concerned about glass breakage issues I suspect they would need to just get out of the Lava motion lamp business because there is and alway has been a risk of glass breakage with Lava lamps.  

Oh, and yes a glass based Fluidium would be cool too but to me not really that different from the plastic versions since the plastic glows with light too like a glass base would. But that glass based Astro was a stunner!   I would have tossed a good bit of extra coin for that one!

Alfred said:

Imagine the Fluidium with a glass base!

All of Mathmos's recent designs seem to be somewhat safety-focused, with both the Neo and iO adding screw-down points to make sure the lamp can't tip over. I imagine that would be a bit hard to do in glass, plus now you have to worry about making sure nothing too bad happens when the whole lamp shatters.

[Alfred]

It seems pretty clear that reducing the risk of breakage to an absolute minimum (when the lamp is fastened together and to the table) was one of the primary design goals of the Neo and iO. That's much harder to do with a glass base and cap.

Critter said:

I would think that if a glass base and cap were made of borosilicate glass (like the bottles are)  there would no real issue from shattering due to heat differentials.  The only breakage that would occur would be due to impact and that could happen to a Lava bottle too.  If Mathmos were that concerned about glass breakage issues I suspect they would need to just get out of the Lava motion lamp business because there is and alway has been a risk of glass breakage with Lava lamps.  

[Critter]

True but it seems to me that if it is truly an issue to them they could simply plastic coat those components too like the new bottles.  

Alfred said:

It seems pretty clear that reducing the risk of breakage to an absolute minimum (when the lamp is fastened together and to the table) was one of the primary design goals of the Neo and iO. That's much harder to do with a glass base and cap.

Critter said:

I would think that if a glass base and cap were made of borosilicate glass (like the bottles are)  there would no real issue from shattering due to heat differentials.  The only breakage that would occur would be due to impact and that could happen to a Lava bottle too.  If Mathmos were that concerned about glass breakage issues I suspect they would need to just get out of the Lava motion lamp business because there is and alway has been a risk of glass breakage with Lava lamps.  

[Alfred]

I'd expect a silicone gasket (or similar) between the bottle and base and cap, but it certainly seems doable. I always thought the Fluidium would be a good candidate for a glass base because of the issues it had with heat.

[Critter]

The Fluidium is a really sexy lamp and it would be great to see it back again.  In glass would be nice and a multicolor glass would be very cool.  In frosted white glass base like the Opal in plastic would be beautiful. 

Alfred said:

I'd expect a silicone gasket (or similar) between the bottle and base and cap, but it certainly seems doable. I always thought the Fluidium would be a good candidate for a glass base because of the issues it had with heat.

[Critter]

I wish they would have offered the Lunar and IO bottle with white wax too.  Why not fill all styles with the combo while at it?  I did not buy one Astro white wax bottle.  I already have two of the previous white bottle production. 

[Barry]

I bought one but havent heard a peep since. You would have thought that they might just keep people in the loop as to and when they might get their bottles but no. And the same with the io lamp, they are saying the end of august for orders placed now. What sort of a company is this? Its 2020 not the middle ages.