Hello everyone. A friend of mine who plays with Tilley lanterns suggested that would it make any difference to light output if the center tube of the burner was a bit longer so it made the mantle longer. I got curious so i jumped on my lathe and made a couple of longer tubes and fitted one 10mm (3/8 inch ) longer and gave it a 45 min try. I compared it to a standard lantern and Definately brighter than a standard lantern . What do people think ?
There is certainly a significant difference in light output when compared to a standard length Tilley burner tube. Considering that the lower part of the mantle would be more centralised in the glass, rather than being high iin the glass, would mean that the light distribution would be greater as is shown in your pics. It makes sound sense to me.
That is basicaly what Tilley did to create the 500 series burner. A longer burner spigot and an increase to the recomended max pressure from 100 pump strokes to 150 strokes. More pressure and the larger lower mantle does make for a significant light increase. I always thought this was poor engineering given the weakness of the X246B base plate. Probably work fine on a pre 1957 lamp though.
