Last night I decided to rewire my Mary Icon light thing. Here it is before. It had an old stiff brown non polarized cord with no switch. Fire hazard? Maybe, but perhaps most importantly, ugly and not very functional. So I got a sacrificial electric candle to rig up for my Catholic art thing. I still don't know what to call it.
Tod do the job I used wire cutters, a utility knife, heat shrink tubing, and not shown, electrical tape. I disassembled the candle, but ended up just cutting the cord close to the base. Then I took the sleeve off the candle, removed the socket and stripped the last half inch of all four wires to be spliced. Then I twisted them together, and covered the splices in heat shrink tubing. The fun part is heating it up with a lighter and watching it shrink up tight around the twisted wire. I couldn't get pictures of this step because I only have two hands.
Then I cute down the white plastic tube that looks like a candle and slid it over the splice which I wrapped in electrical tape to keep everything neat and together.
And viola! The finished product, a pierced metal Virgin Mary 4 watt light thing. I don't know what to call it. But still, now I have a roll cord switch and it probably won't catch on fire. Nice!