I recently re-kitted my old 1974 model X246B with seals and gave it a good clean up. this lamp has done an enormous amount of work and as I have previously mentioned in other posts, has sat neglected in recent years. but I was surprised at how well it came back. I have fired it up and it now holds pressure well with no leaks, but it is no where near as bright as my 1960's Guardsman and a much newer 1990's Tilley. tried a couple of different mantles but to no avail. when lit the mantles have a couple of dark patches that wont go away suggesting to me a bad air and fuel ratio mix. thinking it maybe the hood as the existing one is badly burned, holed and corroded, I swapped hoods but it made no difference to light output. I'm now thinking burner. the three brass air tubes are loose where they screw into the burner, especially one of them as it quite loose and wont tighten up. the male thread is stripped on the tube and so is the corresponding female thread on the burner body. maybe a certain amount of vaporised fuel is leaking past and not into the mantle area? I'm guessing fuel and air ratio is important to get a good blue flame evenly distributed into the mantle so would like to hear your thoughts on the importance of burner integrity.
Loose bits on your burner will make your light misbehave. You could try sealing it with exhaust sealer. I’ve got a burner if you want one. Tony
that was quick. good idea about exhaust sealer but I think one of the tubes is a bit far gone. I'll pm you about a spare burner regards, Bonza
what a difference a new burner makes! below is the old burner. one of the tubes' thread was stripped and it was leaking the vaporized kero/air mixture as can be seen by the white patches. the other tubes were leaking also where they screwed into the burner. so what was being emitted into the mantle was a weakened fuel supply. the leaking vaporized mix would have been burning up where the leaks were today I fitted a new burner that Tony supplied and over 4 hours burning tonight the lamp remained super bright. it's 47 years old, probably good for another 47
Looking good Bonza. - others here have brazed tubes on to get a bit more life from a burner - but they are not that rare so I say replace !
