Restoring Excalibur Lamp Wax

Here was my process working on an Excalibur, hoping this can help anyone on the fence. Lots of pics too see below...

I purchased a wax kit was from Lava Lab Creations. I followed all his instructions which were extremely helpful. I did find some additional tools helped me with this (plus can be used in general lava projects). Safety comes first so I like being on the patio weather permitting for fresh air and not have to worry about breathing vapors, dealing with accidents or spills.

Tools I purchased (most all listed below found at a dollar store, except skewers and hot plate):

Hot Plate

Disposable gloves

Disposable cleaning / dish cloths

Mason or Canning type jars, 2 to 3

White Poster board - used as a large table mat, a backdrop to shows dye color better when mixing, plus makes clean up much better if an spills or drips of wax or dye.

Long Kabob Barbeque skewers 18" - for cleaning down in the globe, pulling out springs, mixing in dyes

Meat Fork - mix dyes, or to scrape inside of jar or funnel.

Opening:
The metal cap is molded and needs to be pryed off with a very narrow thin flat head screwdriver. Worked around a little at time like a Grande Lamp to get around lip. Used a jar jar opener pad to take it off after loosened.

Clean Out:

Dumped old liquid into an empty gallon jug, then the melted wax into a mason jar (will come back to this later.)
18" Kabob skewers: helps pull the springs out of the bottle neck, dragging it gently up through the neck. Also gets the disposable cleaning rags to get into the bottle opening and swished / scrubbed around inside of globe.

Cleaning springs used some simmering pot water in a second smaller Pyrex and soapy solution of Dawn. Rinse clean, pat dry with paper towel. Let air dry or use hair dryer if in a hurry.

The skewers also allow the disposable rags to get worked into the bottle opening and pushed around with the hot soapy water. Dragging it in full sweeps along the sides and bottom helps to scrub the wax off glass.

May be overkill, but after rinsing bottle with hot tap water a few times, my thought is to get rid of any minerals remaining. So on the last rinse I use distilled warm or hot water (can go in microwave to warm). The old dirty water / wax clean outs I place into an empty jug for disposing (landfill better than drain).

New Wax Refill / Pour in:

Prior to this session, I melted a Grande Goo Kit 1 Quart (945 ML), and divided and measured into a few jars for other projects. The one on the right in Blue tape was measured approx 450 ML in prep for this project (my estimate). The rest of the wax went into other jars with lids for future fills. The glass helps wax melt a little faster for next projects too.

I ended up using actually 500 ML of wax.

That being said I realize a Pint kit = 473 ML would be prob be ideal.

The meat fork was used to scrape up any hardened wax shavings from the mason jars or funnel. A hair dryer also works to melt leftover gooped up wax, be careful!

Wax Dye:

You can test where you are going with mixing colors into a small jar of melted wax. Then see results by holding over a lava base bulb to get a general idea. Although he does have a nice line up of colors, I happened to not have Orange, so made it with Red and Yellow. I notice that melted NEW wax is transparent and will look deceivingly saturated color (like Jello looks). After cured and flowing in the lamp it will look lighter or more washed out color. If you have to add more dye later, remove fluid into another container, melt wax and mix in more dye as needed, then cool down to room temp, add fluid back when cool.

I added the new distilled water & surf to the previous fill line. A few inches of the motion is hidden under the cap but helpings blobs cool off and cycle back down.

Sealing:

Have not yet sealed permanently as I was debating adding a fluid dye, but the cap is slipped over the top and it's taped well. Just need to add plumbers Silicone caulk around the lower edge. A Silicone or Plastic hole plug stopper with a Heat Shrink sleeve may do the job too.

Overall extremely happy with the end results!!! Stunning flow and color. Just need the make a decorative disc insert for the top (frosted acrylic with a similar moon, star design stenciled on it?)

Enjoy the super long collage it took a few nights to make! Would love to hear anyone’s thoughts or tips to add to this.