......You Light Up My Life.......

Our non-electric lives are even brighter......Thanks to Aladdin.....Lamp that is, not the boy!  Aladdin Lamps are known the world over for their impressive bright, white light.  As bright as a 60 watt bulb, they are a mantle lamp that burns kerosene or lamp oil.  We have wanted an Aladdin Lamp for some time, one of the drawbacks to an Aladdin is the price,they are not cheap.  We looked around, antique shops, second hand stores, ect. and couldn't locate any.  Then we turned to the Internet, but had similar luck there.  Everyone seemed to know what they had, and priced them accordingly.  So we saved our money for a bit and our lovely lamp came last week! 

Isn't she beautiful?  It doesn't take much to excite us, the whole family was thrilled when it came in the mail!  We purchased from Lehmans, they sell all sorts of non-electric items.  Lehmans sell to the Amish as well as off the grid-ers (is that a word?), missionary's and regular folks.  We love their catalog, you can order one here.

Aladdin Lamps are mantle lamps, they have mantle much like the Colman lanterns.  The mantles are made of a nylon net that is knitted, then coated with rare earth minerals, then it is varnished to help it hold together during shipment.  The mantles are extremely fragile.  One bump or touch and they will dissolve. 

The first thing you do when you recieve your  lamp is burn off the varnish. 

You must do this outside as it burns fast and smokey.....

Once the varnish is gone you can assemble the lamp and fill with kerosene or oil, we use a refined lamp oil we bought from Lehmans, because it's refined there's not much smell at all!  The wick must soak in the fuel for at least an hour then you may light the lamp!!

The burner and gallery must warm up, then you may turn the flame up and your lamp will BEAM!!

Here is a shot of the round wick burning under the mantle. 

Our family has been having practice Non-Electric Evenings and Weekends, we have been using good old-fashioned non mantle oil lamps, here you can see the difference in the amount of light they put out.

We can't wait for our next Non-Electric event, we won't be sitting in the dark anymore!!

We have been doing a lot of research, the best book we could find on the subject of non-electric lighting is

The Book of Non-Electric Lighting by Matson.

This book covers all the lighting types, lamps, lanterns and wood stoves.  It's an easy read with just enough technical information to make it very interesting.  Hope your day is peaceful and your night is bright, ours will be!