Last weekend I visited a friend who has just purchased a bush block of land about 200 kilometers out of Melbourne. its fairly isolated, well away from any towns and major highways. and on the block is a rough shack that hasn't been used in years so the original owner decided to sell it complete with all the junk on the land including old cars and so on. in the hut was a Coleman kero pressure lamp which is now mine. it's not a vintage lamp and looks fairly contemporary, maybe 20 years old. covered in dust, spiders webs etc. I dont know much about these but I reckon it will clean up ok, and I'll put it to use during future camping trips I didnt take a photo of his block of land but these are some of the gems in the area Land Rover restoration anyone?
What a good score and a kero lantern will come in handy for camping trips. Those old cars would be worth a few dollars.
Looks to be a Coleman 214. That's a fairly rare lantern even here. Most 286 parts interchange with it. The generator/vaporisor is different. Coleman recommends a 21a but my 286 kero conversion does well with a Peerless 24a. Nice score there.
yes, it has model number 214A700 marked on it and also to use generator 214-5891. at first glance the lamp looks in poor condition but a closer examination shows it has hardly been used as the hood is not burnt and poor looking condition is just layers of dust and spider droppings after sitting in the hut for goodness knows how long. with care I think it will clean up well. who knows what else is hidden in old country sheds out in the back blocks 21A and 24A are mantle model numbers?
Yes on the mantle numbers. 21a is the most common size Coleman brand lantern mantle. The Peerless equivalent to the 21a is the 2C-HG, the next size up is a Colemal 111 or a Peerless 24a. I'm not sure what mantles are available in your area though. The generator can be disassembled and cleaned to get more life out of it. I recommend every couple of months if you use it often to clean the carbon buildup out before it gets real clogged and difficult to clean. When you disassemble it the first time remove the tip and look up toward the end just below the tip and often there is a piece of wire mesh there that seems designed to break the tip cleaner if you reassemble the generator. Remove it with a piece of wire and chuck it.
That lantern should restore well enough. I have found that those relatively modern Coleman lanterns work better with a larger more bulbous type of mantle fitted, that type of mantle forms closer to the vapouriser/generator than the Coleman type of mantle does and keeps it hotter with the effect that the paraffin/kerosene vapourises properly.
Jeff has a good point on the mantles. I think it is because the straight stick generator Coleman uses works better with a bigger mantle to transfer more heat to it for better vaporization of the fuel. The Preston loop style generator seems more effective at this but it is also more difficult to clean once it is clogged up. Also the Coleman you have has a positive shutoff valve unlike the petromax system so it will also safely run off of Coleman fuel/white gas, straight naptha, and unleaded gasoline. You still will need to preheat the generator though because the kero models don't have the instant light system built into it. It will run low sulphur diesel as well. Just take the generator apart every so often for preemptive cleaning as that's easier than waiting for it to clog up. Unleaded gasoline will leave gummy deposits in the generator and the fount. Diesel will gum the generator quicker than kero but that is just a minor inconvenience for the benefit of being able to run it on other fuels when circumstances require it.
They turn up quite regularly in Australia. They must have been marketed heavily here, probably due to our history of using kerosene pressure lamps and stoves more so than gasoline. Cheers Tony
it lives! pulled it apart and except for surface corrosion on bare metal parts it was in good condition. the pump needed a few drops of oil and bugs had made nests within the inner passages, even making a nest through the pump oil hole underneath on the font is stamped 05 99. I'm guessing that's a manufacturing date of May 1999. couldn't get a genuine mantle from the local camping store but they had Primus S2 single ties and they seem to fit ok. the sales assistant had no clue what a mantle was but hidden away amongst the LED lighting section were some mantles. the generator inners were very clean, so put it all back together, filled with kero and with a new mantle it fired right up. I let it run for a few hours. matter of fact it's still happily burning
Heck yea! That primus mantle looks like it will do nicely and is probably better than the current production Coleman mantles. The Peerless 24a is a longer sock type mantle. If your 214 starts pulsing during operation you might mail order a 24a to put a little more heat into the generator. But is that works well I'd leave it as is.
