Rewiring a vintage floor lamp

I couldn't resist buying this antique floor lamp when I saw it. I had never seen one like it before, with what looks to me like mercury glass, although the sign on it said it was depression glass.


However, the lamp didn't work when I put in some bulbs, and I knew that it needed to be rewired anyway. So, I decided to take on the task of rewiring myself. The first thing I did was to buy two new sockets and a very long cord.



I actually unscrewed the top pieces and took everything off the rod that runs the entire length of the lamp base. However, I wouldn't have had to remove everything as it turned out. One of the biggest challenges was when I tried to feed the cord through the rod. It keep getting caught on itself or on something in the rod and wouldn't feed through on its own. I had read that you can use a Fish Tape, which is a tool electricians use, but I didn't want to buy that for one use only. So, I came up with a solution using floral wire. I had some 22-gauge pieces, so I taped two together with electrical tape and taped the end of this to the end of the cord. It was very easy to feed the cord through that way.



Once I had the cord through, I cut two short pieces of cord from another piece. I kept the old wiring so that I would know how to wire the new sockets and lamp.



I cut the outside plastic off at each end of the two pieces after splitting the cord apart for about an inch at each end. I used scissors to remove the plastic but was very careful. You can use a wire stripper but that was another tool I didn't have and didn't want to buy.



The next step was to take the two pieces of wire and wrap the ends of each around the two screws on each lamp socket. I took the lamp socket apart to do this. The wire wraps counterclockwise and then the screws are tightened and the lamp sockets are put back together.



I ended up having to replace the two-light cluster head that holds the sockets, because the one on the lamp was so old and rusted I couldn't remove one of the old sockets from it. I had to order the cluster head from Historic House Parts.



Then, I connected all the wires and wrapped them with electrical tape. Again, I referred to the old wiring to know the correct way to connect the wires.



I was happy to see that the lamp actually worked when I turned it on. And here's a picture of my finished lamp.