How can i make a tower lamp like the magma tower

[john]

Hi i seen the mathmos fireball and looked at the magma tower. I would like to know if anyone has tryed making one of these. i would use lava louries gookits for it to work. I have seen plastic and also glass tubes by the meter. Does or will a plastic tube work, i know that the heat souce would have not to melt the tube but the glass is workable thanks john

[Jonny Magma]

John,
To put together any thing like our lamps you will spend more money and a whole lot of time for a lamp that will not work. You would also need to violate many patent laws in order to make anything like our lamps. I can tell you in all honesty that it would be a whole lot cheaper to buy one than to try and build a prototype.

I will tell you that you should only use pyrex glass. The temperatures you need to reach at the base would destroy any other kind of glass or plastic. If you call any borosilicate glass manufacturers and find a tube as large as ours for under $2000.00 for an individual piece please forward me their information.

I want you to understand that I am not trying to shoot down your dreams of building a giant lamp. I would not have a job if it wasn't for Louie putting in a couple hundred thousand dollars and 10 years of effort to develop these things. But $1650.00 is a steal compared to building one.

Jonny

[john]

thanks, Marcel for you advice, I am sorry to hear that happened to your lamp you will keep us informed thanks john.

[john]

Hi jonny, this is why i started this discussion, im not going to make a magma tower, I was looking to make a lamp like the mathmos fireball, yes I can see why these are highly priced, I would like to buy one of these from you but the cost is so high at this moment in time.

[john]

I might aswell buy a lunar for this much thanks anyway.

[Jonny Magma]

John,
The biggest hurdle will still be finding a cheap pyrex vase. I recommend for a custom lamp, 250 ounces or smaller, you should try finding a lab beaker. They are pyrex and reasonably priced. They are also really easy to fabricate to a custom base. I have a couple custom beakers that run great.

Jonny

[Jonny Magma]

Marcel,
We ship our towers everywhere. We just sent 12 over to Thailand for the Ripley's Museum.

Jonny

[wayne miller]

I would agree it is killing my wallet buying stuff to make wave machines. I could buy 4 at original price compared to what it is costing me to make one that doesn't look of work as good!

[Orbitz]

Okay, reading this makes me a little nervous. I plan to make a custom Lunar bottle with a goo kit. The bottle I have is an empty whiskey bottle, I think there is a pic in my album. It looks the same as the original bottle aside from the cap of course. But does anyone know if it is heat resistant?

[Orbitz]

Maybe I should run it empty just to see if it holds?

[Orbitz]

Okay, that feels better, can't wait for my goo kit. Thanks baby! :-)

[Bari]

[Bari]

  there isn't a huge demand for giant borosilicate glass cylinders, and that's why they cost so much because you have to get it custom made and it's made for laboratories so very high quality stuff. I spent a long time looking into this because if you could get this cheaply you could make some seriously massive lava lamps really easily. Now I talked to someone who told me something that could help us regarding borosilicate cylinders, apparently when laboratory grade borosilicate is rejected they basically throw away the reject (re-melt or whatever) now this won't helps a lab or the companies selling this stuff much but it can help us.

         (in a lab they have have extreme process thickness and if it's off by even less then a hairs width it's reject)

          They can't sell to a lab because it doesn't meet there specific extreme precision that many modern day experiments require, and thats why it cost so much because they're the only ones paying top dollar to have it perfectly made, but these lab grade glass making companies can't sell rejected glass of because there there only customer (labs) won't buy it, so some companies may be willing to sell there inferior glass at a reduced price so they can make up for the time and money lost making substandard laboratory grade glass. But if there was someone who was willing to pay at a reduced price something they normally can't sell they'll be happy to sell it to someone who's will (better to sell it and get something then nothing at all).

           This glass, even though its inferior to a labs standards it's perfectly fine for us, were not looking for perfection we just need something at can hold water, withstand heat and not brake/broken and this would be pretty oblivious just by looking at what they have to know whether that's the case, you probably could just tell them you need something really big, holds water and needs to withstand heat and they should be able to tell you whether it can or can not.

           Here's the tricky part, i've never actually spent the time calling different laboratory grade glass making companies explain how i'll buy rejected glass from them. If you do you might have to explain what I just told you and why it's better to sell it at all then just throw it away. Of course if you're buy reject glass you can't specify what you're looking for but you can ask them what they have or to call (or you can call later) to see if they might have something closer to what you're looking for later. If there's one near you, you might be able to just go there see what they have and not have to pay for shipping which would be very expensive.

           A another important thing is, even though you will get a discount I don't know how much that is and it's probably up to you to bargain them down to a price they're willing to sell it for and a reasonable price you can afford.

          If this works you might make Oozinggoo.com history. I feel kinda bad that i've held onto this secret for so long without spreading the word... there just might be a place out there will to do this. the scientist I work with seem to think so, but I never actually tried.