Chain Chomp Wall Lamp

Sometimes when you have a child who loves everything Mario, you need to make them a custom Chain Chomp lamp!

A Chain Chomp is an enemy from the Super Mario game series. He is always attached to an anchor block, and when you come near he jumps towards you and strains at the end of his chain barking.

4' long steel chain

1x6 Board - I used mahogany

16ga sheet steel

Lamp cord

Lamp bulb socket

10" plastic globe light

Globe holder/fitter

Threaded rod

6" long 3/8" bolt with nut

Painters tape

Tools used:

Angle Grinder

Drill

Welder

Rotary tool (Dremel) with cutoff wheel

Table saw

Router

Small hand file

I used an angle grinder to cut out the pieces of steel for the bracket. Next I welded the pieces together to make the wall bracket. It needs to anchor to the wall and support the weight of the chain. Pretty welds are optional, as very little of the bracket will be visible.

I stretched the chain out straight, holding it in place with magnets. I welded each link to the next, rotated and welded the backs of each link as well. At the top I added a few links at an angle, so it maintains the desired angle of out and down. The bolt goes through the holes in the front of the wall bracket, and through two links of chain. The chain can pivot easily on the bolt to aim the light left or right.

I hacked up a link of the chain, and welded 1" of threaded rod to it. The link bolts to the end of the chain and allows the head's angle to be adjusted up/down with a wrench. The threaded rod screws through the globe holder into the back of the bulb socket.

I cut off 5 pieces of the 1x6 mahogany board, each 5.5"x5.5". Tilting the blade to 45 degrees, I beveled all 4 sides of each piece. Then I glued them into a faux box without a back. Last I used the drill and the file to cut two slots into the front of the box where the rounded ends of the bracket need to poke through.

The box looked too plain as it was. I noticed the pattern on the original chomp block (in SMB3) and decided to use it. I printed a block out to scale, and traced it onto plywood. I used a drill and a router to cut out the pattern in the plywood. Next I used the plywood as a template to carve the pattern into the two sides of the box using a pattern bit in the router. After spraying black paint into the pattern and sanding off the surface, the wood was protected with Simple Finish (boiled linseed oil with wax).

I used painters tape to mark off the mouth area and define the teeth. This was very helpful as I ended up moving the lines around quite a bit until it looked right to me. I used my Dremel with a cutoff wheel to remove the material from the mouth. I used a hand file to smooth out and straighten the edges.

I masked off the inside of the teeth, as well as the eyes inside and out. The inside was painted a dark red. Next I taped off the mouth and neck completely, and painted the outside black. When that was dry I removed all the tape, and made a small circle mask for the eyeball. After hitting both eyes, the paint is done!

I screwed bracket to wall, while making sure it was level and into a stud. The faux box pushes on over the bracket and is a tight enough pressure fit to stay in place. The chain is attached to the bracket with the bolt. Last, the neck bracket is attached to the end of the chain and the head mounted.

With a smart led bulb installed, my kid is super thrilled with his lamp. He tells his Alexa to change the color all the time, and dims it to use as a nightlight. As you can see in the last photo, it really fits in with his room decor.

Thanks for looking!