Hi Everyone! I've been fiddling with old lamps for years, I find the whole restoration process very therapeutic and marginally cheaper than my previous love of rebuilding old motorbikes - Imagine my surprise when I found a Website / Forum devoted to them, with so many people just like me from around the World, full of such useful information! Took me a while to register, log on and say hello though - Sorry for that! It started with a Tilley X246B my Parents gave me for my 18th Birthday, now I have a couple of Hipolito's, an Anchor, two Colemans, several Vapalux / Bialaddins, a Tribe of Tilley's, a selection of "Wickie" Hurricane Lamps and some fabulous old Blow Torches, there's also a Parasene Stove! I'm an Aircraft Engineer by trade, so I guess Paraffin / JET A1 fuel is now well and truly in my blood. I'll try to attach a few pics - There will be many more to come!
Thanks Guys Great to be here! I used my original Tilley for many years on family camping trips, until my Wife eventually banned it in favour of a Camping Gaz gas canister lantern, which wasn't much better to be honest! She was convinced I was going to blow myself up - Still is! I have to be honest and say I was completely oblivious to other brands of lamp until fairly recently - Only now am I the Kid in a Sweetshop, marvelling at the cornucopia of lamp styles, shapes, designs and names that have faded from everyday use in favour of the very practical, but literally cold LED! I'm going to be controversial now :- Much as I love a Petromax style lantern, and I do, I've just bought another Hipolito H-502 Auto for restoration, I find them infuriating things to rebuild and set up, and whoever invented the squashed lead seal principle for the burner tube / flamethrower / tank interface? Plus, the shonky old Chinese Anchor I have visibly puts out better light! Don't mention the rust though - Shocking! Vapalux / Bialaddin, I have a 300X, two 305's and a 315 converted to electric (Story for another day). I love them dearly, and I read that they are considered much better quality than a Tilley, but I have to say, I get far more problems with mine than I do with any of my Tilley's! The models I have are a bit fiddly to light too, having to lift the glass to light the preheater wick, drop the glass back into place, then pop the hood back on, whilst not burning your fingers too much! Coleman, I have a couple, they work OK, but my examples do not use any kind of preheat device causing much mirth, merryment, black smoke and flames at start up time! We're also back to steel tanks and rust! Tilley, while I can see the the quality difference between an early X246, and a late model X246B, I have all variants. I think they get more criticism than they should. They are simple, they are cheap, but they work, spares are generally plentiful and they are rugged, and I don't think anybody would go far wrong with one. A few more pics to study!
Welcome to the forum mark, looks like the lampitus bug has well and truly bitten, nice to see your pictures, we all like pictures on the forum.
Welcome to the forum Mark, you have a nice selection of lanterns. To make lighting your Vapalux / Bialaddin easier (i.e. no need to remove the hood), get a meths container with a spout. Here's my example, a short length of 3/16" or 4 mm metal tube stuck in an old dish washing bottle.
Thanks Henry Now that Sir, is ingenious! I guess you just lift the glass a little, and slide it underneath? Regards Mark
We used to have wash bottles in the chemistry lab that were very much like that but with a poly tube. I bought one with the copper pipe on line - quite cheap - but realised once I'd got it that making one would be as simple as simple. Cheers
Correct. The original meths tin had a straight spout which is all that's needed for Vapalux / Bialaddin lanterns. Originally, I made a spout with curves to fill the spirit cup on my Coleman 237 (single mantle 500cp kero lantern) but found it also worked well on Vapalux and Petromax / Optimus type lanterns without a rapid preheater.
