How much surfactant to use in a Goo Kit Grande?

[Josh Van Cleave]

A while ago I purchased a Red/Clear Grande from Lava Lite (lavalamp.com), unfortunately it arrived more like milk/red.  I re-did the grande using Distilled water and Dawn and Epsom Salts.  It works alright but it is not crystal clear like the one's I see on here from the pictures that have Goo Kitt'ed their lamps.

 

So I ordered a Goo Kit from eBay.  My question is, I know the instructions give amounts of surfactant to use, but I wanted to hear from some people with experience.

 

So, with a grande how much surfactant should one use, I will be using a quart of wax.  Is there a range to stay within?  like 35ml for big globs and 60ml for small fast globs?

 

Can I start low and add more surfactant if I need/want additional flow?

 

Any advise is appreciated!

[Dr. WHAT?!]

I've always used 55 ml of surf for my grandes and all flow excellent with the use of dimmers. Gookit wax tends to run hot on the standard 100 watt bulb.

[Wile E. Coyote]

I used about 35-40ml for my 3 grandes I've done.  Being that it is just distilled water and surf, if you put to much or totally screw up the ratios, just dump the liquid and refill 'er up!!  I did notice that it took a couple runs for everything to settle in.  I was gonna add more surf to a couple of them after the first run cause they were a little too slow moving, but I just left it, and a couple runs later, it moves the way I like it.  Some larger blobs, smaller blobs, and good long snakes of goo rising and falling.  I do use dimmer's on them all, and cut them to about 60-70% and they flow great for hours.

 

Good luck with the goo kit!!  They're totally simple to do, and the results are killer!!  Remember to swirl a little surf and distlled water around the clean globwe before you pour the melted goo in!!

[Josh Van Cleave]

Great tip on the distilled water and surf to clean the globe before adding the goo.

 

My Goo Kit should arrive this week sometime so hopefully I will be Goo Kitting the lamp this weekend.  Looks like I will start with about 40ml of surf and then do a few runs and add more if the globs are too big. . .

 

 

Wile E. Coyote said:

I used about 35-40ml for my 3 grandes I've done.  Being that it is just distilled water and surf, if you put to much or totally screw up the ratios, just dump the liquid and refill 'er up!!  I did notice that it took a couple runs for everything to settle in.  I was gonna add more surf to a couple of them after the first run cause they were a little too slow moving, but I just left it, and a couple runs later, it moves the way I like it.  Some larger blobs, smaller blobs, and good long snakes of goo rising and falling.  I do use dimmer's on them all, and cut them to about 60-70% and they flow great for hours.

 

Good luck with the goo kit!!  They're totally simple to do, and the results are killer!!  Remember to swirl a little surf and distlled water around the clean globwe before you pour the melted goo in!!

[Josh Van Cleave]

Ok, the Goo Kit arrived and I re did the lamp. It turned out pretty good I think.  I used a tad under 50ml of surf.

The one I re-did is the Green/clear one on the left. The other is a stock Lava Lite lamp.

The other pic is the CAP, it was originally red/clear (actually red/milk)

[Wile E. Coyote]

Well Done!!  Gumby Green!  My next one is going to be Kermit Green!!