White wax that yellows

[ATB]

I know there has been talk about white wax that turns yellow over time; noticeably at the base of the flowing goo. I have a 90s lamp with white wax and blue liquid.

Is there a white bulb that will will fit in a century and not make the wax look as yellow at the base?

Also, has anybody goo kitted a lamp with white goo and seen yellowing after months or years?

[Brad]

unfortunately there is not.  white LL wax turns off white/yellow over time.

[Carol]

I've goo kitted a few and kept them all white.  My son's which is white wax in a very super light blue water is a goo kit from the summer b4 last and it is still super white!!!

[ATB]

Thanks for the info, Brad and Carol! Much appreciated :-)

[Shoozie Q]

New here, but I bought a used China lamp that had orangy yellow wax, looked awful.  I added some white oil paint and now it looks like real cream.  Don't know if it will last, but looks way better.  Also don't know if I did it right,  I am waiting for some sage advice from OG.

[Brad]

welcome to OG!  honestly, you did it right if the lamp still flows and you're happy with the outcome.  if you don't mind, please post some photos of the lamp, what you added, and how much so that others can give it a try.

[Shoozie Q]

  The lamp is a little bitty 12" from China.  Started out turquoise with yellow wax and quite cloudy. Got rid of the turquoise and got clean water in there which is when the wax showed it's true colors (orangy yellow). I bought a few artist oil paints to try cause I figured that's where I could get the colors I wanted to mix in an oil base.   This little lamp was for practice while I waited for my gookit, so I had nothing to loose at this point.   The main color I used is called "Soft Mixing White" it is thinner than the straight  pigments (more on this later)and comes in a tube. After I surfed and salted the new water and heated till I had a blob of nasty colored wax at the top, I used 2 toothpicks to pick up a bit of paint about the size of 1/2 a green pea and dropped on the top blob of wax.  It fell straight through and to the bottom , seemed to kind of settle in and near the coil. Waited 10-15 minutes for the paint to heat up and used  "washing machine action" to begin mixing the paint in. Lamp still running and the little bit of flow was slowly mixing also. Figured I had most of the paint up in the wax after a couple three rounds of mixing like this. You could see the pigment  and the wax was looking whiter.   I repeated the whole process with another same size bit of paint.  Total amount of paint used a bit the size of a green pea or a small dried bean.  Total time to be thoroughly mixed about 40 minutes.

   The next thing I tried  after getting  a nice creamy white was adding some blue, but this was normal thickness paint and  is mixing very, very slowly. I can see tiny blue flecks but not the swirls of the softer thinner white paint I had seen while mixing it earlier. Lesson learned I believe straight pigments will need to be thinned with a some oil medium or a mixing color like the soft white.  Next time I will thin and mix my color in a small container. When I get my kit I want to mix up a medium emerald green with oil medium and see how that mixes with  some new goo in my empty bullet.

   I will keep this little lamp as is to see how well the new color holds up and whether there is any effect on flow from this dye job.     Hope this was understandable.  Will post a before and after picture this evening.  Questions welcome, tho I doubt I know any more than you. . .

[Keith]

Well, I don't recall anyone else detailing any success with oil paints, so, you are the leader of the pack!  I do hope it holds up to regular use, so please keep us updated.  

[Shoozie Q]

Pictures:  I hate to post the original picture it is obviously heavily photo shopped.  I didn't take any pics in real light, but trust me my description was very accurate compared to the midnight in a mine shaft shot from ebay.

[Keith]

Wow, if that hold up I would say you have discovered the ultra-white wax that many have been wanting!

[Brad]

agree, that looks great!

[Shoozie Q]

UPDATE :: After my initial semi-success I can't say the artist oil paint is a viable method.   I only had 1 color that worked (or at least appeared to work) actually it kind of coated some of the wax and never really blended with it.  Looking closely at the cream colored wax a couple days later you can still see faint swirls of the paint.  Did another batch in my empty lamp with higher contrast color - dark teal and white - And it is very visibly not mixed in but coating the wax.  The other colors mixed even less and I have the feeling I could be cleaning wet oil paint off the bottom of my lamp weeks, months, or years from now.

I'm going to try thinning before I give it up completely, but I think it's a bust.  Sorry, No Joy . . .