Recycled Can Lamps

Regenerative & Transitional Technology Transition Tech
#1

Making an oil lamp out of old soda/beer/seltzer cans is easy and takes only a few minutes. All you need is two cans and a few inches of rope or something similar to use as a wick.

Cut the bottom part off of two cans, at least a few inches worth of each. Trim the edges to reduce the amount of sharp and rough spots. In one of the can bottoms, punch a hole with an awl or something similar, making sure to make the hole wide enough. Then cut a small rectangle of can out of the side of one of the can tops, and wrap that around the end of the rope. Pass the wrapped end of the rope through the hole in the can bottom, leaving the wrapped section in the hole. Then slip the can half with the hole and wick inside of the other can, upside down so the wick points upwards. To make slipping one can inside of the other easier, I usually cut two slits up the side of the inner one. Take some tallow or vegetable oil and fill the can and saturate the wick with it. Apply fire to wick and voila!

#2

Never having used an oil lamp–are you supposed to move the wick up a little bit each time before lighting the lamp? Or does the wick move up through the metal wrapping as it burns, by some magical principle of science? (In that case, I’m assuming you wouldn’t want to wrap it too tight.) How quickly does wick burn anyway? (I’ll go ahead and answer my own question and say it probably depends on the rope and the oil.)

#3

You sometimes need to move it up a bit. The wick itself barely burns, and instead it’s mostly the fuel being burned.

Bingo, especially concerning the oil. The more flammable the fuel is, the less the wick itself tends to burn. Petroleum fuels, like the stuff sold as lamp oil, burns with a rather flame and that barely uses up the wick (like in the tiki torches sold for summer cookouts and such), whereas tallow and vegetable oils burn with a small to medium flame and scorch the wick a bit faster.

#4

Aha, so the wick is just a vessel. I think that’s actually really fascinating.

The only wicks I’m much familiar with are candle wicks. :slight_smile:

#5

Even with a candle wick, much of what’s getting burned is actually the wax that the wick has been soaked in, though more of the wick is burned than in an oil lamp.

One thing I thought I should add is that the more of the wick you have exposed to the air, the bigger then flame because more of the fuel is burned (increased surface area). This might seem obvious, but should be mentioned.