Can you guess what topic we have been exploring looking at the picture here?! Well, something as mundane as capillary action comes to life when it is connected with the correct application.  I made a simple lamp with a strip of paper rather than cotton wick to demonstrate the fundamental principle of capillary action that allows the lamps to burn for hours. That led to this rather interesting question – if its the oil that’s burning on the wick, why doesn’t the entire oil in the lamp catch fire? And if we put a matchstick on the oil and removed the wick, would the whole thing burn?

The answer is – it depends on which oil you are using in the lamp and what is the source of heat. The oil requires a certain temperature to catch fire (ignite).  The matchstick just cannot provide that much heat to the oil for it to catch fire. It will be possible for the oil to catch fire if there was a heat source that could heat up the oil to the necessary temperature (think cooking pans). 

Interestingly, if the bulk of the oil in a lamp does start burning, it would burn out very quickly rather than for hours. In the lamp, very small amount of oil, in its vapour form, burns very slowly and that allows it to last for long hours. 

So, now we have the stage set for the next question – what are the necessary conditions to make fire and how can we achieve it? …Curiosity to Learning path never ends!