Make a Lava Lamp

Make a Lava Lamp with Household Ingredients

 

Have you ever caught yourself being hypnotized by a lava lamp? You hold it in your hand, move it slightly, and watch as the liquid quivers and separates into different shapes and colors. Then you look at the price tag - and put it back. To do your wallet a favor and make a lava lamp with household ingredients, follow these instructions. 

1/Get a 16- or 64-oz soda bottle. 

  

2/Add oil, water, and food coloring to the bottle. Fill the bottle 3/4 of the way full with vegetable oil, then top it off with water and about 10 drops of food coloring (or enough to make the solution appear fairly dark).

3/Cut an Alka-Seltzer or Airborne tablet into pieces. You can either ration the pieces to make your lava lamp last longer or add more than one piece at a time for more interesting effects.

4/Add pieces of the tablet to the bottle. This will cause the mixture to bubble. (Repeat every time the bubbling stops.)

 

5/Put the cap on and tip the bottle back and forth. This will cause the tiny droplets of colored water moving around inside the oil to join together, make bigger lava-squirt blobs.

6/Place a strong flashlight or search light under the bottle. This will illuminate the bubbles for maximum effect.

 

TIP:If you don’t have Airborne or Alka-Seltzer, salt works as well.