As in the title- is normal to have a drive with the cleaning needle after every 30 minutes?? If not doing so- my 1020 for sure starts to give out less of lumens. Bigtime. I am running it with excellent fuel. All parts are superclean. This model is supposed to be a workinghorse..? Please advise Kind rgds Henrik
Forgot to add- the tank is of course not SUPER clean. Could it be the culprit?? Does it not get enough of air?? (If so how do alter this VERY basic tube). Could the problem possible be with mantles I use?? I have played around with Peerless suitable for the 300s.
I don't know about the 1020 specifically but any lantern from any manufacturer that needs pricking every 30 minutes or so probably has crap in the tank. At the very least, it sounds like a thorough cleaning and flushing is required. You may need to go as far as adding some nuts and bolts, a short length of chain or a quantity of ball-bearings for example and swirling them around to loosen any crud adhering to the inside of the tank...
Hi Henrik, I need to use the pricker very seldom on mine, very often not at all from startup with a full fount to empty. On the 1020, the bottom of the fount is also brass, so be very careful not to shake dents in it! Aside from flushing the fount, the vapouriser tube and pricker rod probably has carbon build-up . You can soak them in toilet bowl cleaner, oven cleaner or caustic soda solution to soften and dissolve it. You can then also use a +/- 5mm brass rifle brush to get the rest of the carbon out, and flush out any loose stuff with carburetor cleaner spray afterwards. I use the Peerless 24A mantles on mine. I find that the 1020 burns very reliably from just a dim glow at almost no fount pressure, all the way up to full power, which rivals most 500cp lamps. When rated in terms of reliability, performance, robustness and ease of use, these lanterns really are tops.
A good cleaning of the tank will help for sure. Also, these lanterns are easy to over pump (at least my two 1020 lanterns are). I find if I pump it 25-30 times it starts to burn outside the mantle and the light starts to fade. I pump the lantern about 18-20 times (with a full tank of fuel)and that's all it takes.
Some great advices here gents. I will clean the tank- again. AND take George´s advice of not over pumping. As for the vapouriser and the pricker rod. I have indeed used a rifle brush for the vapouriser and thought that would be good enough. (No solvent involved in that process). May have to use a additional cleaner detergent. Did not thought that would be necessary to be honest. The inside of the vapouriser looked neat after flashing a good flashlight through it. Again- many thanks fellows- will report on the progress. May take a week or two though- small kid around- and I am awfully tired these days..
Interesting what George says about pumping. On the five (1937-1955) that I have, with new/unworn jets, the harder I pump them, the brighter they burn. It does indeed not take much pumping for them to produce the rated 300cp, especially on a full-ish fount. I remember that the first 1020 I got, initially was quite finicky and also tended to burn outside the mantle and become dimmer, but changing the jet and fitting a nice big mantle cured it immediately. I have even experimented with resizing the jet aperture in situ using a small hollow-domed pin punch. If you can align the punch accurately over the hole and tap very gently with a tiny hammer, you can shrink the hole back to size and so extend the useful life of the jet. Best done under a magnifying lamp and testing frequently using the pricker. No guarantees and not for the faint of heart as you may end up having to replace both the jet and pricker.
Will a soak in acetone for a few days be ok..? Or how long would you advise a soak to be? If it´s ok with soaking I will leave it for that and follow up with the manual treatment with ball-bearings. Again many thanks for swift replies fellows.
Most solvents like acetone, petrol, paint thinners or benzene should help dissolve the old gummed paraffin residue. As David said, swirling (not hard shaking) with small metal parts will also help. But the carbon in the vapouriser will not be dissolved by acetone. You need a strong base like lye (caustic soda) to do that.
It's better to use "sharper" objects. E.g. screws and nuts. Just make sure you use magnetic parts. It's very tricky to get the last ones out of the tank otherwise. But with the help of a small magneto, it's nothing to it. And the vapouriser is best treated with a stiff gun brush in combination with heating and quenching. Don't forget to scrape off all crud that might exist on the cleaning needle rod too. There is usually quite some carbon build up there, and tiny particles will come loose and block the jet now and then, so best to make sure that part is clean too.
Hi , I am getting very frustrated by now. I have done the following: -cleaned the fount according to above tips -cleaned the burner and the pricking rod -mounted a fresh jet and needle What on earth could be the problem? The lantern starts just fine and just dies after 15 minutes. The only thing I could think of is the fuel tube on the fount. Could there be crud stuck there? Is that common? Do you fellows use a brush for the fuel tube? I got a spare fount so I am close throwing this out of the window.
There could be a partial blockage in the fuel pickup tube or in the "pricker control" body. Have you checked fuel flow with/without the jet on the vapouriser? Are you sure that the fount is retaining pressure? Common culprits are the fuel cap seal and especially the pressure release screw. You can do a dunk test with the fount in a bucket of water, pumped up, pump plunger removed and with the pricker turned up into the jet.
Thanks Phil. Yep, I did the dunk test-I just forgot to add that to the checklist above. The fuel check you mentioned sounds interesting. Can you please advise more in detail how I can determine any possible failures with the fuel flow? Again many thanks! Henrik
Take the lamp outside, with the ventilator, glass globe and air tube removed, and pump it up. See whether you get an uninterrupted stream of fuel coming out of the jet orifice for a few minutes. Also try this after removing the jet. It is a rather messy process; best to hold the lamp downwind from you and have some paper towels on hand. PS: Is the jet tightened well enough when you run the lamp? A loose or leaky jet could also cause the symptoms you describe. I always use a dab of Copaslip, a copper-bearing grease, on screw threads and mating surfaces when assembling lamps. It forms a seal and helps you to tighten parts better without mechanically stressing the metal.
Storm . To check flow remove burner assembly and install a piece of clear plastic hose over the generator tip leave jet in and run the other end into a clean bottle.Pump up font open valve and let it run into bottle see what crud comes out if non remove jet and repeat this way you can see whats happening . You can check flow and see if you have blockage to Bob .
Good idea with the clear plastic tube, Bob. It will work even though the burner and vaporiser are one part and there is no fuel valve.
Never funny to read a thread without the OP coming up with a solution so here it goes. Bad fuel. Apparently I´d stored the fuel for too long. It smellt ok but upon close inspection I noticed that it had turned to a more yellowish colour. I have´t tinkered with my small collection for a year or so, so after the troubling 1020 I tried to lit a few other lanterns with the same meager result. Fresh fuel cured everything and the lanterns now behaves perfectly well. About the stored fuel. I had it put away in one of our closets. The 5 litres tank was a plastic one (for petrol). Never used for storing anything but paraffin in. Was the plastic container the culprit? I dunno. Any opinions about storage..? Lastly- thanks again for all your inputs. I will have them in consideration if I stumble over other troublesome lanterns. /Henrik
If you have empty Coleman fuel cans, they are excellent to store kerosene, I store mine in those cans and it stays fresh, plastic cans tend to "leak" gases from the fuel, and make it stale quite fast. I have fuel from three to five years ago and it burns nice. PS, I have a Primus 1020 I "resuscitated" a couple of years ago, it has a Petromax 250 HK gas tip and needle...I love it.
Some plastic bottles containers have a used by date on them .If you buy some in plastic bottles etc and not using straight away decanter it into a tin container and fill it right up to the top not much air space and store in a cool place .never store a container on a concrete floor etc ,on a shelf or pallet . Bob .
Great advices. Many thanks Weirdnerd and Lamp Doctor. I certainly will have these in mind the next time I´ll buy paraffin that I´ll intend to keep for some time. The paraffin I bought was first class when I bought it and if I have known better about storage I would have saved many hours of re-doing some tedious and unnecessary fettling. /Henrik
