Post #6218 by Swanky on Mon, Aug 19, 2002 10:10 AM

As for making a glass float, I have to believe it's better to buy, if you shop around. If you ask a question like "how can I make one, and where can I get glass bowls" it just seems like a lot of trouble. Not trying to be a smart-alek, but it just seems from what I have seen and heard here, you can find what you want for better prices than what we have seen on Ebay for the big glass floats with nets.

As for lighting: I have been researching this with some electronics geeks, but have yet to do my floats and blowfish lights. It does seem that the floats around are more matte, translucent than mine which are very clear. So, maybe a clear matte spray would make them look much better once lighted. I wouldn't do color. Just get colored floats and spray them matte on the outside.

Don't worry about heat, because, you won't be putting that much light/heat into them. You want that authentic, dark, tiki bar look. And if you are lighting your blowfish, you really can't get very bright/hot.

My thoughts are to build the lights from radio shack parts. There's a good chance they, or other electronics places can guide you. You want the smallest diode they have. Tiny. And you want the thinnest wire you can run to it so you can hide it. It won't take much juice, so you won't need a heavy gauge wire. You also want to put it on a capstan (dimmer) so you can play with it's light once done. The guys I talked to around here said I should run all this off a battery. I am just wondering how long a battery would hold up. I'd rather find a converter. And that brings me to my next ideas. Model trains. Find a hobby shop for model trains. They make lots of tiny little lights and have all the hook ups to run it of wall current, because they make all these little houses and stuff that use just the sort of wattage and detail we are looking for. So, what I really think you want is gonna be found fast and easy at a train hobby shop. A spool of thin wire, a transformer and a few tiny bulbs and a soldering iron and you have it licked.

And on an added note, you could also run a few more lights off that to other places. For instance, you can run several under the lip of your bar and maybe inside the bar for nice ambient light. Illuminate that awesome bamboo bar you paid good money for/made for all to see in you dimly lit tiki domicile. These little lights will have a thousand great purposes as accent lights for every wonderful piece of Hawaiiana in your bar. A small shield attached diretcs the light to your tikis, mugs, etc. and allows you to see them well without destroying the mood.

Well, there's my 6 cents worth. (my 2 cents and the two electronics geeks I chatted with.)