Tilley Hood "railing"

Just a quick question (I have looked in the gallery but this didn't answer my question).

I have seen a Tilley lamp that I think is a 426A. It has the bent supports but the older style hood.

The hood has what I can only describe as a "railing" around the top of it. I haven't seen this before. What is this? Is it to put a kettle on the top or something?

 

The X-246a has a cage which curves at the bottom, I do not know what you mean by the term railing, so some photos would help, Jeff.

 

It is a circular structure on the top of the enamelled hood that looks as if it might be designed to support something. Unfortunately I can't post a picture.

 

Is the hood like the one which is shown in the link below?

http://0flo.com/index.php?threads/3185

 

No I think I may be incorrect and it is an X246B but with a ring on the top of the hood. I've never seen this before.

 

To answer your question properly a photo will be needed, Jeff.

 

Fair enough Jeff. I think it is an unusual hood variant designed to boil a kettle on the top.

 

Then I fear you may have quite a long wait...

On the other hand, a Tilley X246 series lantern will quite nicely heat up a sweet mince pie - but leave it in the foil cup...

 

Svenedin, the lamp you are talking about is an X246b and I would agree that the structure on the hood is designed to support a kettle or pot of some sort. At the price it made I would say that someone else spotted that as well.

 

Thank you Matthew. Yes someone else did spot it but I bought it. Pics will follow.......

 

Congrats, I look forward to seeing some close up photos of it cleaned up and in action.

 

Yeah, well I didn't so is there any chance you could just post a link to it so the rest of us can see it..?

 

Here is a screenshot

 

Thanks - looks like an in-service modification designed, as you suggest, for a kettle or similar. It would be interesting to see how long it takes to boil a small kettle, although I suspect it would be more useful for keeping something hot.

Thinking about it, I suppose I could just get up off my backside tomorrow and stick my camp kettle on an X246B and see for myself...

 

Yes, I don't know how effective it will be. I thought it might be fun to brew up on the top of the lamp and lamps certainly get extremely hot. I think a thin walled aluminium camping kettle should work.

Is this an after-market modification or did Tilley actually make this type of hood?

 

Well, that's a good question. According to 'TG' (who he?) on the listing:-

"Hi there, That's a true modern rarity you've got there.. Outwardly, it's a basic Tilley X246B, but look again and see it has the ultra rare ring around the top. That's to allow you to boil up a kettle, or boil/fry your food on top of the lamp. I suspect it was intended for night-time anglers, to give them light, heat, and cooking facilities on a long night's fishing.. Best regards, TG"

On the one hand it does look well-enough made to be a proprietory item, but on the other, I've never seen anything like that before - not in the flesh, nor on any lamp site, catalogue, advert and I've never heard anyone mention them. So we'll see...

 

OK. It does sort of make sense in terms of the concept but if you have never heard of this before then it seems more likely it is a post-manufacture addition. Are Tilley any help with this kind of thing?

 

In my opinion this is a cut off piece from an earlier globe cage with three rings.

The cut off piece is then set upon the hood, maybe welded on. The picture isn't good enough to see more...

I am sure you can boil water on it, there are cooking tops available for Petromax lanterns and there is a Radius lamp with a cooking top as far as I remember. Why shouldn't it work on a Tilley...

 

I don't think it is made from an old globe cage because they all have one ring outside the supports and one inside. What is on the top of that lamp appears to have both rings on the outside. It is made in the same style and the gauge of metal appears to be the same so I would guess that at some point Tilley sold these. But that is just me so we shall wait and see. Best regards Matt

 

Matt, there's actually three rings on the cages, and both upper rings are on the outside.
I think Stephan is correct. It looks exactly as the upper part of e.g. an X246A with the attachments for the handle removed.

 

Absolutely not.

It's a good while since I've phoned them but when I did, it was evident they hardly knew what they'd produced the previous week, never mind years ago.

I'm going with the globe cage rings idea - seems entirely reasonable to me...

 

Yep i'd go with Christer & David on this one & as you know i usually have some bits lying around the workshop so watch this space

Stu

 

Well, I went shopping in Aldi today and by coincidence, they had cheap Chinese hacksaws for sale. Hence I bought one and I'm just off to the garage to perform some non-elective surgery on an X246/A/B globe cage. I've been busy otherwise I would have done it earlier.

So watch this space also...

Edit:-





So there we are - "a true modern rarity" (or not, as the case may be). I suspect not because it slips around all over the place and is hardly safe for boiling or cooking anything on. At first, I left small legs about 5mm long at the bottom but it was unstable so I cut them off, thinking the lower ring would get a better purchase on the enamel top. If anything it's worse.

It's going in the bin...

Further edit - looking at the original pictured above, has it got an annular metal plate at the bottom to locate it around the taller part of the ventilator..?

 

My bad, I forgot about that extra ring under the hood. I guess my head wasn't quite with it this morning but you will see why in due course... Hmmm what could I mean. Best regards Matt.

 

Hi David

If you look at the left hand rearish side of the pic you can see the slope of the hood air inlet cover so i'm not sure if there is a plate , maybe just dirt looking like it , i may be wrong but the hood may be drilled to accept some longer bits of the stub legs you cut off this would make it very stable & useable , what do you reckon

& don't bin the ring put a pop can stove or some other meths stove under it for a great little stove

Stu

 

True, but if you look at the other side, it looks flat. Also there seems to be a distinct 'edge' where the vertical side of the upper hood meets the horizontal-ish lower part - it's usually a small radius curve there.

But as someone said, it's not a good pic and we'll see when the lantern arives...

 

Yes, I'll clean it up and post some pictures. I hope it doesn't take too long to arrive because I'm off to the USA for 3 weeks at the end of next week......Unfortunately I can't take any of my lamps due to restrictions on tanks that have contained fuel. I would have loved to have seen my Vapalux M320 at the campsite in the Rockies.

At the very least I'll end up with a Tilley and I don't actually have one. Admittedly it's the unloved X246B. A new set of washers is on order so I can fire it up and see whether this contraption works.

 

Hi All

Tried out the Tilley top rail heater idea today , it does work but took 20 mins to boil a pint of water . I drilled some 5.5mm holes to locate the rail this made it super secure , The leg stubs were cut to 3/4 inch length

It did work a little faster when i made a simple one sided wind break to help keep the heat from being blown away , a complete wind shield around the inside of the rail with a 3/4 inch exhaust gap around the top would seem to be the way to go

Pic's









Stu

 

Hello Stu, neat fettling!

I rigged something similar many years ago and it worked well enough in the shed, but for outside use your idea of a complete windshield is the way to go, Jeff.

 

I wonder if it is possible to roast meat on it if you put a grill on the rail...