Goo won't do

[Mitch Fountain]

Looking for tech support.  My goo won't do.  I have an old lamp orange on orange.  It has been treated well but only swells up (or should that be "has been treated swell and only wells up?  anyway ...) into a gravid lump and never quite erupts.  From some reading, sounds like I could try and add a little pickling salt and a couple of of drops of dish detergent.  The detergent for the slipperness of the glycerine and the salt to raise the density of the water and make the goo more likely to ascend.  Help please?

thanks .... Mitch

[Modulo '70]

Indeed, as Bohdan says, a pic would really help. Sometimes on very old lava lamps the wax or 'lava' wears out and can never be fixed. If it's a newer model there are likely other issues involving bulb heat or maybe the positioning of the coil ring just under the wax.

Jerome

[Mitch Fountain]

Of my two lamps one takes a 25 and one a 40. I have a forty in this one, so I think I;m as high as I can go.
Picture an orange balloon with about 3/4 of a cup of water in it hanging limp ... maybe four inches from the throat to the body of the balloon with the throat about 1 inch in diameter then bulging out to the body of the balloon about two inches in diameter. Now ... turn the whole thing over and stick it in a lamp. It heats up, does the gush, then settles back to this static mushroom shape and just sits there. I can see convection occuring in the jar, but it's like it need just a little bit extra to make it ascend and fission off a blob.