It’s a lot easier to drill through the base. I’ve done it myself for a similar situation.

Yeah but I forgot about the pesky investigators will find I tampered with the bulb and with my luck I'll leave my fingerprints or DNA behind on the bulb. That's it, I am busted. Crime was much easier years ago, even writing crime fiction stories was easier than today. Just look at all the forensic tools these guys have. Yes, I also wondered what type drill bit would be best and at what speed but carbide tip and high speed simply sounded good. Never did it though.

Ron

 

I don't suggest you try this in real life, but I remember a caution using high intensity halogen bulbs...when you installed them, you were not to touch the bulb with your bare hands to avoid skin oil deposits. I wonder if a drop of oil would break an incandescent bulb once it got heated up? Again, I don't suggest you try this at home as it could be a fire and health hazard.

Some claim that the warning regarding halogen bulbs are more urban legend than reality. I can't find anything hard one way or the other. The best I could track down in short order are some anecdotal stories from theatre stagehands indicating that the bulbs that were touched resulted in evident blackening and deformation and much shorter life.

But halogen bulbs operate at much higher temperatures and use quartz glass. Very different than typical bulbs. Consider the appliance bulbs often used in an oven -- they get coated pretty heavily with grease over time, yet they seem to last forever.

 

A light bulb that "burns out" is ancient history. Many people reading your novel will not know what it is. Instead use a modern LED light bulb that catches on fire like the compact fluorescent bulbs given away for free from my electrical utility company. The cheap Chinese bulbs used a certification label stolen from a competitor so the bulbs were never certified to be safe to use. My free bulbs were replaced before I tried them.

Well, I've certainly replaced plenty of bulbs that never burn out -- CFL and LED both. Just had another LED bulb fail the night before last and it's less than a year old.

 

I would not squirt anything into the bulb. Anything combustible could lead to an explosion. Anything not combustible won't do anything that air won't do..

How about stink bomb powder?

 

I recall those warnings with HP mercury lamps, but not with halogen bulbs:

https://media.osram.info/im/img/osram-dam-2298243//fo_warning3.pdf
https://www2.lbl.gov/ehs/safety/nir/assets/docs/uv/UV curing system safety tips.pdf

Apparently, as the fingerprints are cooked into the envelope they supposedly weakened it.

Edit: Come to think of it, I have seen the same warning with high intensity halogen lamps that have a bare quartz tube. I was thinking of household halogen lamps with a second envelope.

 

? ! ? ! ?

I use to drill through the bases of burnt out light bulbs to make flasks for a home chemistry lab.

Plus!

One time, I hosted a Halloween party for my High School friends. I had several effects which ran off a hacked kitchen timer. Burning sulfur, objects that were thrown throughout the room by themselves, lights suddenly shut off... When the lights went dark, I had my friends turn on two stand-alone lights in the room. With the “hole in the base” trick, they immediately blew with a small flash.

That’s what I was referring to when I said “a similar situation”,

 

I don't know how bulbs are made where the rest of you live, but there is a sealed thick glass "wire holder" in the bases of the ones sold around here. So drilling through the base is still going to hit glass just a much thicker more solid piece of glass than the envelope(bulb shape). The thick glass in the base is called the "stem", had to look it up. It's #7 in the picture., and is held in the metal base with some sort of putty. From - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incandescent_light_bulb

In 71 years and having been around many bulbs that failed, I can't recall ever 'hearing' one when it failed. Or breaking it's envelope.

 

In 71 years and having been around many bulbs that failed, I can't recall ever 'hearing' one when it failed. Or breaking it's envelope.

I’ve heard bulbs fail, some relatively loudly. It happens when the filament has lost integrity and the inrush current blows it like a fuse. On smaller lamps, where the bulbs is closer to the filament, this sort of failure can blacken it.

 

It’s a lot easier to drill through the base. I’ve done it myself for a similar situation.

I remove broken light bulbs by jamming the tip of some needle-nose pliers up into the base, then pulling the handles apart so that the tips spread and grab the inside of the base. Then it unscrews quite well. BUT ALWAYS WEAR SAFETY GLASSES when doing this because there are often some glass fragments. AND switch off the power to avoid tripping the circuit breaker or popping a fuse.

 

I don't know how bulbs are made where the rest of you live, but there is a sealed thick glass "wire holder" in the bases of the ones sold around here. So drilling through the base is still going to hit glass just a much thicker more solid piece of glass than the envelope(bulb shape).

I covered this with the TS in a PM; I've been waiting to see if anyone would catch it.

ak

 

What a Dremel? Just every "comrade Leninš lamp" aka Edisson's have technologic hole about 1,5 mm thick in the very middle of central leaded tip of E27. Normally lead it covers so it is invisible, but hole still is there where wire comes out of glass to contact and lead is rather thin. With ordinary sewing needle is no big deal to punch it. Then, push this needle about 2 cm deep and skew in randomly until it touches that thin glass "tail" used for technological vacuuming of bulb. It is thin and petty, 50 grams of force and tail is crushed so the air is in. As the tail itself is so thin and well elaborated in base of bulb, the 99 cases out of 100 those main bulb will not suffer. Make all spy-tricks as simple as much possible.

At the need for larger dramatism, may use the syringe to inject in this small hole some few miligrams of acetate peroxide solution (acetone+H2O2+microdroplet of H2SO4 as catalist). Until liquid is stable, but as soon as dried - boom. Dont overdose. Never even think to touch dried, superbrizant.

MisterBill2. OK, Im doing the same way for "Polish" E27 what are fixed by springed hooks. But "real" plugs are, or at least was made de-screwable. So, then one hand keeps bulb plug upper part, other is screwing off the lower part until the lower is at the hands far off the grid - take the fingertip and screw the garbage out and then lower part screw back to the upper part. Voila, and no plyers, no risk for short-circuit.

 

I'm holding an A19- 120V bulb that has second filament wire soldered to edge of the base. Drill thru solder & base, finish with diamond
thru a thin layer of glass, then solder over the hole. Corrode the fresh solder a bit with the head of a match. The heavier glass stem is down another 5 mm.

 

No, fair Author, better NOT include the simple methods in the story. especially about acetone. Use at least plutonium instead! World is too much filled with a poor-brained fools keeping mountains of irrealizeable anger toward all and every. Its not good to teach them HOW TO. There is too much risk to end with similar results as school shooting. When I teached physics at prizon, I used their ill interest in air-balloon construction, because none and never will construct such balloon for aim of escape the prizon. But I never told them how with a finger tick in seconds to crush the 2 inch thick metall rod or lock, because sooner or later they may be let free. So I am not telling it even to You.

 

I remove broken light bulbs by jamming the tip of some needle-nose pliers up into the base, then pulling the handles apart so that the tips spread and grab the inside of the base. Then it unscrews quite well. BUT ALWAYS WEAR SAFETY GLASSES when doing this because there are often some glass fragments. AND switch off the power to avoid tripping the circuit breaker or popping a fuse.

Although I didn’t state it, I also ran into this. But because the glass at that point is enveloped by the base fill material, it was much easier to deal with. I collected burnt out bulbs from the families of friends to practice.

 

OK, I got it..... first, he gets a couple of 12V bulbs. When insert into a line circuit they blow as soon as the switch is hit....

Next you get a normal 120V bulb, and you hollow it out....

Now you insert the 12V filament and associated stem and such from a new bulb, into the hollowed out 120V bulb. tighten all up, somehow, and your murderer is all set.


I might add that when this same question came up in a thread elsewhere, https://forums.anandtech.com/threads/how-do-i-burn-out-a-lightbulb.954251/ one fellow insisted that urinating on the bulb would do it...this appears to be more problematic to me.

 

remove broken light bulbs by jamming the tip of some needle-nose pliers up into the base, then pulling the handles apart so that the tips spread and grab the inside of the base.

Never have that problem. I stop it dead in it's tracks. Vaseline or dielectric grease. Used for 50+ years. Started with a blurb in in a light for an aquarium when I was a teenager.

 

OK, I got it..... first, he gets a couple of 12V bulbs. When insert into a line circuit they blow as soon as the switch is hit....

Next you get a normal 120V bulb, and you hollow it out....

Now you insert the 12V filament and associated stem and such from a new bulb, into the hollowed out 120V bulb. tighten all up, somehow, and your murderer is all set.


I might add that when this same question came up in a thread elsewhere, https://forums.anandtech.com/threads/how-do-i-burn-out-a-lightbulb.954251/ one fellow insisted that urinating on the bulb would do it...this appears to be more problematic to me.

Yeah I think urinating on it is out. Even if it would do anything, I don't think my character would enjoy it--not really his style. BUT from that other forum you linked to, there's this: "Turn it on and let it warm up for about 5 minutes, then spray alcohol on it. The alcohol will evaporate, cooling the surface of the glass, and causing it to develop tiny cracks through which the gas will leak."

If I have my character experiment with a few failed methods first, I might use this one. Do you think the poster was referring to rubbing alcohol?

 

No, fair Author, better NOT include the simple methods in the story. especially about acetone. Use at least plutonium instead! World is too much filled with a poor-brained fools keeping mountains of irrealizeable anger toward all and every. Its not good to teach them HOW TO. There is too much risk to end with similar results as school shooting. When I teached physics at prizon, I used their ill interest in air-balloon construction, because none and never will construct such balloon for aim of escape the prizon. But I never told them how with a finger tick in seconds to crush the 2 inch thick metall rod or lock, because sooner or later they may be let free. So I am not telling it even to You.

I appreciate your concerns. However, this is for a novel, not an instruction manual. I plan to include a couple of intentional errors into the scene to discourage miscreants. In order to make the scene as realistic as possible, I need to understand the science behind it. However, I've already received plenty of guidance, so no need for you to reply.

 

Never have that problem. I stop it dead in it's tracks. Vaseline or dielectric grease. Used for 50+ years. Started with a blurb in in a light for an aquarium when I was a teenager.

It seems that the bulbs with the cheap aluminum threaded base and the cheap aluminum sockets tend to be tight after a while, and some folks twist those bulbs in so very tight that they break going in. And so other folks were breaking them off, then I get to remove them. Not for free, though.

 

I don't know how bulbs are made where the rest of you live, but there is a sealed thick glass "wire holder" in the bases of the ones sold around here. So drilling through the base is still going to hit glass just a much thicker more solid piece of glass than the envelope(bulb shape). The thick glass in the base is called the "stem", had to look it up. It's #7 in the picture., and is held in the metal base with some sort of putty. From - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incandescent_light_bulb

In 71 years and having been around many bulbs that failed, I can't recall ever 'hearing' one when it failed. Or breaking it's envelope.

I don't recall having any break when they've failed (unless sprayed with water or something), but I've heard them pop quite loudly on many occasions, including an in-ceiling 65 W flood that failed a few days ago.