11

TUTORIAL

Copper pipe lamp

Mains electricity is dangerous – This project involves

working with mains electricity. We have endeavoured to

provide accurate advice. However, it is ultimately your

responsibility to make sure that any lamp you make is safe.

Make sure you understand the risks of working with mains

electricity before embarking on any project that uses these

voltages, and seek advice from someone experienced with

the risks if you’re unsure. You are responsible for your own

safety. Take that responsibility seriously.

WARNING!

Steampunk lighting that you can make at home

Copper

pipe lamp

lectric lights are perhaps the

most basic electrical item. At their

most basic, they contain just two

components – a bulb and a switch.

This simplicity gives us plenty of scope

to put our own artistic twist on the

design. We’ve gone down a common route of using

copper pipe to create a custom frame for our design.

This pipe is both easy to work with and looks great.

A yellow-orange light accentuates the colour of the

copper, resulting in a visually

pleasing lamp.

When working with mains

electricity, we obviously need to

make sure that we’re kept safe

from live current. When building

appliances that are hopefully going

to be used for many years, we

don’t just need to make sure that

they’re safe at the point we build

them, but that they’ll remain safe.

We’ll do this by both reducing

the chances of something going

wrong, and putting a mitigation in

place in case it does. We’ve built

a lamp that we’re happy with, but

ultimately it’s your responsibility

to understand the risks inherent

in working with mains voltage

electricity, and make sure your

lamp is safe. It’s beyond the

scope of a magazine article to go

through all the risks of working

with mains electricity.

The obvious risk with a copper

pipe lamp is that, somehow, the

live wire gets in contact with the

copper pipe. If someone then

touched the pipe, they could have

a serious shock. Because copper

is conductive, it’s inherently more risky than making

a lamp out of non-conductive material, so we have

to be more careful to ensure this doesn’t happen.

The lamp could get live in two ways: either the

cable could be pulled out of the bulb holder, or

the flex could become damaged inside the pipe.

To reduce the risk of these happening, we’ll make

sure that the cable is secured at the point it exits the

lamp, so tugging on the cord doesn’t put force on

the connection between the flex and the bulb holder,

E

Right

The completed

lamp doesn’t

have to illuminate

your wine rack,

but it can

Ben Everard

@ben_everard

Ben loves cutting stuff,

any stuff. There’s no

longer a shelf to store

these tools on (it’s now

two shelves), and the

door’s in danger.