If, by chance a fellow who does not know much about all of this (yet) has an old Coleman table lamp rated for Petrol and another rated for Kero, then can they BOTH burn Kero? I may have to cough up or fabricate a priming cup for one of them. Or, are there jet sizes to consider, etc. Thanks in advance for helping to further the education of this (elderly) lad. Piper
Besides preheating, there's the issue of the air/fuel mix. I suspect that you would have to change the jet(or generator) on the currently petrol model. I recommend you drop over to the Coleman Collectors Forum (http://colemancollectorsforum.websitetoolbox.com/) and have a look around. Al
Hi Piper, I may be mistaken but I believe most kero products from Coleman used a straight pipe fuel pickup tube instead of a fuel/air tube. I'm still not satisfied that the f/a tube passes enough kero even when opened fully. These aren't the best pictures but they are what I have to work with right now. This picture shows the orifice on the left side in the lower hole for the fuel that is coming from the fount on a kero lamp, this lamp has a straight fuel tube slightly smaller than a drinking straw. This is a picture of the lower orifice in a fuel/air tube on a gasoline lamp. While the pictures look to be the same size the tip shown on the bottom will fit into the lower hole in the upper picture. I haven't convinced myself that it will get enough fuel to burn correctly. That said I do have a model 139 lamp that states you change the generator from a T44g to a T44k, the difference is that the K tip has a different size orifice. You also need to add a preheat cup. I haven't pulled it apart to check the fuel tube design.
Hey Neighbor, yup, based on John's earlier recommendation I visited and joined the CCF. Now all i have to do is retire so I can spend some quality time playing with my hobbies. Sure, that's gonna happen.....Not. Piper
The gasoline fuel pick up will pass enough kero to burn successfully. You just have to open the valve fully. However the air mix will be wrong. You need slightly less air with a kero lamp and for this reason true dual fuel lamps always have an adjustable air intake of some kind. Aladdin and SunFlame did it by providing a shut off for one side of the twin air intake tubes. Coleman did not make such a lamp although you can run some of their Kero lamps such as 237 on gasoline. Lamps like 168K use the standard R55 gasoline generator but whilst the burner unit appears to be identical to the normal twin mantle gasoline type in fact it has a restrictor built into the air tubes to facilitate a kero burn. Coleman lamps such as 152 will run on both kero and gasoline but require a generator change to do so. My advice as always is to use the fuel the lamp was designed for and if you want a kero lamp then buy a kero model and don't try to convert a gasoline type. ::Neil::
Begging your pardon Sir, But I beg to differ with your statement.... "Coleman did not make such a lamp although you can run some of their Kero lamps such as 237 on gasoline." Coleman did produce a compromise lantern called the 247 Scout. So "Yes" it is dual fuel with no generator changes. And "No", there were no elegantly engineered controls to regulate the airflow as per some properly engineered lanterns. (Perhaps a lever choke on one intake tube would help optimise the kerosene brightness!) Sincerely ThomasL
OK , so what you are telling me is that i need to buy at least one lamp of each model in both Kero and Petrol? What if a third fuel is or was or later becomes available? More lamps? Does my wife know about this? Piper
Hey Piper, Yes, more lamps. You need at least one for kero and one for gas; you can start by looking HERE
