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I am an avid lava lamp collector and have over 40 lamps in my collection. I have lamps from the late 60s up until the early 2000s, before Lava Lite moved their production to China. Somewhere around the early 2000s, Lava Lite moved their lava lamp production to China and the quality of the lamps have diminished so greatly that I find no reason whatsoever to purchase any of their new lamps. There is a reason you don't see ACTUAL photos of their lamps on their website and Facebook all their images are digital renderings and not real photos. Wonder why that is! :)
Awhile back, Lava Lite promised they were working on the formula. Even though they swear the formula hadn't changed, they were promising to fix it. Hmmm. Well, I was duped. I had bought a Lava Lite in summer of 2010 when I was just starting my collection. That lamp was cloudy and didn't flow. I returned it the next day and started doing my research. It doesn't take long to figure out that Lava Lite's quality has been in the pooper for awhile now. However, being that us collectors were promised a change, I excitedly ordered the Designer lava lamp when they were released a few months ago, in clear/red with a red shiny base. I should've known better. When I received my lamp, it was cloudy, and though older US-made lamps WILL indeed clear up with running, this lamp did not. There were white flecks in the liquid, too. Big, white flecks.
The base was an interesting change, but the metal is cheap and even the holes at the bottom weren't all machined straight. I did find the finish on the base to be acceptable.
The lava lamp did flow, but if you've ever owned a US-made Lava Lite, there's no comparison. With the newer formula (I'm pretty sure they've lost the original formula) you get one or two blobs floating up and down and that's it. This lamp simply wasn't pretty to look at.
Most of us collectors know we're fighting a losing battle here, so I believe our only point is to inform the public do not buy these lamps. This is NOT how lava lamps are supposed to look. Though this is indeed the same company that produced beautiful lamps for over 30 years, they've been bought and sold one too many times and clearly, whoever is running this company does not care about quality. You can write Lava Lite all day long and complain and you'll get the same answer/excuse every time; "They were shaken during shipping", "Run them for a few weeks and they will clear up", "We'll ship you another lamp (that's guaranteed to arrive just as cloudy)", "We have lamps here in the office and they look just fine", "We haven't received many complaints", "The formula hasn't changed"...
Spend the extra money and buy a vintage (before 2002) lamp on your favorite auction site or a Mathmos lamp. Sure, it'll cost more, but you'll love it and you'll be happy with it for years to come.
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Milky white water with a red blob at the bottom. A red blob that doesn't move. It just sits there. What a disappointing waste of money.Best Deals for Lava Lite 4201 17-inch/32 oz. Designer Lava Lamp, Yellow Wax/Purple
I bought the yellow lava, clear liquid lamp thinking it would resemble the lamp I saw on the packaging resembling bright yellow melted crayons. Sadly it does not. The liquid is cloudy and the lava is such a orange-yellow color that it looks exactly like egg yolks floating around in the egg white which would be cool if displayed at Waffle House but not in my theater/game room. I've used the lamp twice at 6 hours each time. The liquid has seemed to clear a bit, not totally, yet the lava will probably always look like egg yolk.Honest reviews on Lava Lite 4201 17-inch/32 oz. Designer Lava Lamp, Yellow Wax/Purple
I was about to give up on purchasing one of these lamps due to the large number of negative reviews. What people are receiving seems inconsistent at best, but I got lucky. Nothing was broken, the fluid was clear, and the lamp works exactly like it should.I bought the lamp with the yellow wax/purple liquid/purple base. It does not look totally like the picture though, which is a good thing in my mind. The wax varies in color depending on where it is in the globe, changing from yellowto orangeto red. The fluid looks purple during the day, but I run the lamp at night, and it looks more 'red' than anything. This is what I wanted, and took the advice of others who posted pictures in their reviews. If you are looking for a lamp where the dominant color is red, this is it. I posted a couple of pics in the item description.
Also, the purple base looks more like a 'metallic lavender'. It's much lighter in color then shown in this listing(and in my personal photo).
After plugging it in, it took about an hour and 15 minutes for the lava to become active(as the manual states). In the subsequent nights, it's taken about 60 minutes to become active.
I'm now thinking about getting another lamp, and hoping for similar results.
Update 5/24/12: I purchased a Grande Yellow Wax/Purple Fluid shortly after this. The fluid in that lamp was cloudy compared to this lamp, and I also noticed more imperfections in the glass. I see another negative review popped up on this lamp, and I think it's safe to say that this lamp should not be purchased unless you have the time to return it.
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