Why is it not safe to put essential oil on light bulbs?

I have done this for a while now, and last night I smelled something burning. I turned the light off and unplugged it and I have been trying to look up why you can't put the oil directly on the light bulb. I can't find anything. I know...it seems like a stupid question, but does anyone know?Why is it not safe to put essential oil on light bulbs?
If you are concerned that you may have gotten oil in the screw shell you can unplug the lamp and use some dry cloth to wipe the base out.





Incandescent lamps get very hot. Its a bad practice to put oils of any kind on them. You can cause the bulb to fail from hot spotting or worse cause a fire.





My girlfriends mom used to put oil on bulbs and one day put enough on that it flashed, thats when she stopped doing it. She also had numerous failures before from putting oils on the bulbs. After continually putting oil on the bulbs the residue would continue to build up and finally the bulb would overheat and fail.





In school one time we had a demonstration where a 100W bulb was laid on a 2x4. After a while the board started smoking and finally caught fire.





Please don't do this, its just not safe at all.Why is it not safe to put essential oil on light bulbs?
It will fry the bulb. You can buy an oil ring to put the oil on that sits on your bulb. Then the bulb won't go out.
You may want to keep in mind that even with a ring, the oil is being burned and it does emit a very delicate sooty oily smoke. It can cause lung and health issues for some people and will actually kill birds. I did not know this and killed a pair of $500 exotic birds. So if it can do that to a bird, the oily smoke can affect us too. A good option is to buy your fragrant oils but use defusers to let the scent float/evaporate into the room. It is very effective and you don't have to worry about exploding light bulbs either.
The oil, even small amounts, can make the glass heat up more than it should, like a hot spot, causing failure. If more than a few drops, it may run down the bulb to the metal causing a short circuit, or worse, a fire.