Glass Bottle Oil Lamp

Step 6 Let Sit, Then Light

Now for the profoundly boring part: let it sit. I reccomend letting it sit for at least an hour, so that the entire wick is completely soaked with oil. If you don't wait long enough, and it's not completely soaked, the wick will burn off and the lamp will go out.

The wick should last you a good long time, but if you ever need to, you can pull more through the cap or easily replace it with more cotton scrap.

The lamp may take a few seconds to light, as oil doesn't light easily, but once it is lit it should stay that way until you either blow it out or run out of oil. It is easily blown out, and the light is bright enough to read by.

Never leave a lit oil lamp unattended. As I mentioned earlier, if it were to spill - maybe a cat or dog knocks it over - the results could be very, very bad. Even with the cap screwed on tightly, fires spread very easily and more quickly than you may realize. I take no responsibility for anyone who burns their house down with one of these things!

Comments

[cortwein]

Could you fill the whole bottle up with oil or do you have to have the water?

[TraumaComet]

Great Instro! This is green in so many ways that it boggles the mind. Cool.

[burpreynolds]

Could be greener if we were using oil that had to be thrown away anyway.  Like used fry oil, or even used motor oil.  Why waste?

[ilpug]

motor oil is stinky and not nescessarily "green" it would work though, as long as it wasnt that modern chemical kind.

[soundmotor]

Nice instructable. The only downside to a bottle is that if bumped, it could fall over. I'd like to try this with a wide-base jar or similar.

[tigerboy]

To fill you in on the history of olive oil lamps. They were used with olive oil in them on ships so that if they spilled they wouldn't light the ship on fire.