But for a blurry Tilley 1969 catalogue reproduction I’d not have appreciated the lamp’s primary purpose, to illuminate operations on a Tilley Tourer butane stove. Evidently it would originally have had a cylindrical globe - a Petromax one is the right height but a bit loose in the diameter - but I fancied incorporating a Tilley glass, hence the arrangement pictured. John
Great presentation John. At the time they must have thought of this as the "wonder fuel" and the future of portable heating and lighting.
@Fireexit1 Thanks. Not the future of portable lighting for sure, but Tilley’s gassie rival, Bullfinch, still seem to enjoy a healthy trade in portable heaters, stoves and blowtorches.
Thanks John.. that makes a lot of sense seeing the set up i did see one of the Tourer stoves and it looked well thought out with the folding arrangement.. i don’t remember the GL lamp though but i can see how useful it would be I seem to remember there was there a gas globe 2081? Interesting that the transfer says Hendon? Maybe they made these for quite a while? It looks in good condition! Certainly lpg has a lot of advantages and with the boom of caravan holidays it was very convenient .. I don’t know how the prices were back then but paraffin was certainly very cheap? Glad that bullfinch are still going pb
The globe number’s handy to have, thanks. I know Mike at Base Camp has an extensive stock of gassie globes - a Veritas frosted one for under a tenner fits an Optimus 200, should someone hanker to pair them up. I’ll consult with Mike. I wondered about the ‘Hendon’ decal too. If I remember rightly Tilley moved to N. Ireland in 1961, yet the catalogue featuring the lamp is from 1969, so as you suggest a respectable production run is indicated, and early in the development of butane appliances. Mind you, I’ve a British butane stove (Wee-Dex) that was around in 1949 if this advertisement from that year is anything to go by. Take a look at the lamp they produced incidentally!
@Anthony I’m grateful for the leaflet, great stuff. Evidently my lamp with the ‘T’ suffix was intended primarily as the Tilley Tourer stove attachment, lacking the option for a hose connection feed from below, which wasn’t necessary connected up to the stove.
Very interesting John - I hadn't realised the purpose of the 'T' variant. I've a couple of those Tilley Tourer stoves lurking in my lock-up...
@David Shouksmith Yes, a surprising discovery from that catalogue entry! A word about the ceramic burner, which originally would have looked like the one pictured in THIS post by @Anthony. Mine had the slender mantle support broken off, leaving just a trace of it where I’ve circled in red (Anthony’s photo). Without that support for a double-ended mantle I’d to tie on a 500cp Petromax-type (Chinese) single-ended mantle and burn it in with the lamp briefly upside-down to get it to inflate properly.
Update Finally (!) I’ve managed to find the correct Tilley glass for the lamp, part No. 2081. Also, I now have the ceramic nozzle specific to this lamp with its distinctive mantle support to enable a soft mantle to be used ‘upright’ rather than suspended and the correct Tilley mantle, which forms a large pear shape when inflated.
Yup, I've got one of those lamps! I really must get around to unearthing my stuff and get it moved on...
