I agree with paintguy. Acrylics increase their adhesion with time. What scraps off after 2 hours may well be adhered after 2 days. As to Behr paints, I have personally made test samples of Behr Ultra, Marquee and WB Alkyd over sections of hard, slick, high gloss oil paint. I hand these to customers and defy them to scratch it off with their fingernails. They are wearing thin with literally hundreds of tries, but they are still intact! Wanting to see the worst case scenario, I did not sand or de-gloss the oil paint. I am an old school painter, raised on oil pains and somewhat of a doubting Thomas. I have become a believer. If someone's paint is "balling up", I would wonder what is on that surface? Was it cleaned of oils from hands or other pollutants?

It is easy to find the rest of the lamp (the harp, tube, etc.) in any hardware store. That's kind of the opposite of what you are thinking. I agree it makes sense that the decorative part is more likely to break. I guess they sell these lamp kits because you can make a lamp out of anything, really. If your base is a standard ginger jar you should be able to find something similar.

Look at this picture of a gazing ball stand. Just make it longer and the base wider to offset the height inbalance. I would pour some cement down the tube after I assembled the base to make it very bottom heavy. If you don't want to buy this pattern, I can tell you how to make it really quick. cut your base plate( 3rd pc) cut 2nd pc with a hole in the center slightly larger than pvc pipe, then cut 2 pieces of wood to fit inside of your pvc pipe ( you will save one for the top), predrill holes along the bottom edge of the pipe fit the smallest one inside the pipe screw it in, attach the 3rd pc from the bottom into the 1st pc. slip the 2nd piece over the top of pvc pipe, attach from bottom of 3rd pc. run your wiring, fill with cement about 1/3 of the way up, assemble your light kit on the extra sm pc of wood, place screws 1 in below the top edge of the pipe make sure they are long enough to support your wood, then attach the pc of wood with light kit the same way you did the sm bottom piece and you are good to go. If you want you could make the bottom and top match, or just add the small one. I am including a picture hope it makes more sense, because I am not explaining this too clearly. It shouldn't take you more than 1/2 hr to assemble this. It sounds alot harder than it looks. I am making some of these to hold my bird houses and bowling balls. I have some really large thick floor tiles I am going to attach them to and then imbed the tiles under soil so they aren't affected by the wind outside. If I can explain it any better for you or if you want me to I will draw up exact plans if you send me measurements. I am attaching my hand drawn instructions here I will attach the gazing ball stand in the next one. Good luck Dena Here is a link that might be useful: instructions

Pal said exactly what I was thinking. I always see this sort of switch in Hotel rooms. I wonder if you could identify and tap into the commercial supply sources for the hospitality industry? A quick search turned up the following supplier. In addition to switches in the base, it looks like many also have outlets (in a hotel this would let you plug in your phone charger or laptop), and there may be Ethernet ports as well. Hard to tell, as the descriptions weren't good. Here is a link that might be useful: American Hotel Register Company