Grande Questions with Dimmer

[LaughingGravy]

Hello from NJ USA, and thank you for adding me as a member. 

I have what appears to be a Grande from China....yeah, I know. Yellow/Blue Liquid

It's a little hazy, but the problem is not the haze.

Coil is clearly at the bottom. The bulb appears to be correct. What is the proper distance of the tip of the bulb to the bottom of the globe?

The lava at the bottom undulates, clearly a well melted pretty level mass, but not a huge overheated egg shaped blob.

Little globules (approx. 1 cm diameter) form from the center and rise to the top, then fall back down to the center and roll to the edge of the mass, then melt back down.

Based on searching many posts over the past week, I think I have a situation where it is overheating. 

I have a dimmer as of yesterday, but what percentage should the dimmer be used. 90% 80%, 75% of max. brightness, and for how long before I should expect to see a change?

Temperature in the room is a steady 71 degrees F.

[Keith]

Hmm, what wattage is the bulb?  If it's not a 100 watt bulb it won't get hot enough.  The bulb should be 1/4 to 1/2 inch from the base of the globe.  Can you tell if the little gobs of goo have water bubbles in them?

[Keith]

Can you post pictures?

[LaughingGravy]

I'll post pics tonight, and confirm the bulb.

[Gwen Williams]

does it ever go through a flowing stage at all, generally overheating happens after it has been flowing a bit.

[Brad]

i concur with gwen.  also, the ambient temperature of 71F might be keeping for lamp from warming properly.

[Alfred]

71°F should be just fine, but it will take a long time to warm up. My Grande takes about 5 hours to really get going at that ambient temperature.

[Bridget T]

Mine can take up to 6, and I only get great, multi-blob flow after about 8-10 hours on.

[LaughingGravy]

OK, since last night, the bulb is 100W/120V, matches others on the site that I've seen is the R20 shape/size based on comparison data at the local hardware store. You can see in the pic that the bulb was sitting low. I have since added a bulb extender, so the bulb is now 1/4 inch from touching the concave glass at the bottom of the globe.

With all of that, it starts out with a tower when cold, then that melts down to the large mass at the bottom, with exactly the same large-marble 1/2 inch sized balls coming up from the center (every 3 seconds or so). They go right up to the top, hang there for a bit (shrink in size a bit due to air coming out, so now cm sized), then drop right back down with kind of a splash, creating a little wave of activity, then rolling to the edge of the glass and eventually reabsorbed.

This time though, it did have a brief flowing period in the first 45 min, which lasted for about 5 minutes. Based on it doing that , then going to the marble/air to small ball drob, I am thinking it it overheating.

I had it on for 5 and a half hours last night. My wife doesn't want it on when nobody is home or while we are sleeping, which I can see. 
Based on the replies by Alfred and Bridget, my next step needs to be for a longer time, but I guess the question of what setting to do the dimmer comes up. 

Say, at full bright, for the sake of argument, it heats up too much...If I dim it down, assuming I hit the correct level
( whatever that is), should the flow to to normal, or do I have to find that magic spot (G-spot/goo spot Ha Ha) without an overheat, as in the overheat messes it up?

[Brad]

i still don't think it's getting hot enough.  to overheat one of these lamps, they need to be on for quite a while.  before overheating, the lamp will usually flow for a good while (much longer than 5 minutes), then wax will begin to hang up top and/or dome at the bottom.

[Gwen Williams]

is there moving air in the room you have the lamp in, like a fan or forced air?

[LaughingGravy]

No moving air at all. Baseboard heat on the opposite side of the room.We have hanging things on the ceiling that move with the slightest of air currents.  Based on the replies, we are turning it on now, and I'm keeping it at full bright. By bed time of midnight, that should be 10 hours.

I really appreciate the quick replies. Here's hoping.

[Bridget T]

I would be tempted to put it in the way of the baseboard heat temporarily and see what happens.  I really don't think it's getting too hot.  At least there, you should be able to speed up the heating up period so you don't have to stay home all day.