Hey all , I have been astonished recently by an old 500c.p. Luxor mantle surviving a fall from my head or chest height . I was walking through a wooded copse upon a hill , here in somerset, in the night with 2 of my children and a friend.... The way was lit by my old german army Petromax lantern burning panel wipe/white gas/reinbenzine . I had the lantern hanging from along wooden staff but i managed to knock that against a tree whereupon the petromax head-dived to the ground sufficient to bend and buckle the chimney! The lantern continued to burn and the glass and the mantle were both undamaged ...i lit the lamp agin a few nights ago and the mantle is still doing great ..... Here are some photos-
Why oh why are you burning “panel wipe/white gas/reinbenzine” in a Petromax? Or is there something special about this one?
Simply put , and with all respect to the experts of lantern design , i like to use this lantern indoors and this fuel gives a cleaner burn , i have two petromaxes , one of which has a parrafin vapouriser , and this army one which has a "Universal" vapouriser .... i keep this lantern very tightly fettled and am quite happy with the design , as well as being aware of the ... limitations That the swiss army were happy enough to use such lanterns to me speaks for thatself , also there were lanterns produced by Hasag /Eugen Schatz etc which were also for volatile fuel and had no "off switch" at all , only the pressure release ..... Regarding the pressure release.....i did some tests years ago where i attempted to light the vapour shooting out of the pressure release button ....this lit , only so long as i held a lighter in the stream of vapour however ...... These things are a matter of personal choice , i feel that the petromax is an excellent design of lantern and is very versatile, however.... The user has to be very familiar with which areas to service , and check them regularly in order to be comfortable with volatile fuels....The lantern has to be as tight as gas-piping, for example For these important reasons....i also can not recommend the use of such volatile fuels by an untrained or inexperienced person in the inherent dangers and obligations of such use.....The dangers are real and they not only can , but do manifest from negligent servicing etc.... The lantern in this picture is a Petromax 829B model from 1960 though i had to replace the (stress cracked) German army tank with a Swiss army tank from their petrol-burning model recently. Many regards , R.I.Rer
Rer, no matter how well fettled the lamp is and how good the design or engineering is, there are factors outside your control that could too easily turn it into a flame thrower and/or bomb. It just takes a tiny flake of leather getting stuck in the pump NRV or any one of a variety of external factors for this to happen. While I respect your personal choices, I sincerely hope you do not have cause to regret them one day.
Make sure your house insurance is up to date. You will need it on the day the pump check valve fails. ::Neil::
Thing about advice is you don't have to take it and we have to respect folks right to ignore us. In the past 50 years I have had two lamps empty the tank whilst burning. As it happens both were Primus and running with kerosene which made a bit of a mess. If that had happened with any type of gasoline there would have been a serious fire in each case. Those pump check valves are pretty good but can fail. In a Petromax the check valve is at the bottom of the tank and a failure will empty the tank through the pump tube. A remote possiblity maybe but a risk too far for me. ::Neil::
Yes, that happened to me, too, and it was also a Petromax that became incontinent. The lantern was running downstairs and I was chatting to Bart Meijer on the phone upstairs. Eventually the stink of paraffin reached me but not before the kitchen floor was flooded. If that had been petrol, I think I'd have noticed the flames coming up the stairs quicker than I noticed the smell...
Thank you , Neil , and of course this is true , i have had both Tilley and Petromax do this very thing..( possibly even Vapalux....) each time i had been negligent in servicing the lantern , with parrafin , of course that is not(always) sich an issue ..... With petrol/gas/benzine of course the level of forgiveness of sich negligence is small , if any . While i appreciate the needle valve and pump tube... coleman type of design as a benchmark of design for burning volatile fuels , and needle valve petromaxes / hasags too , the simple petromax 829 has a simple lock to the pump , if the leather is good , and ifthere is a springfeather at the leather, even if the valve fails the fuel does not rapid empty , i have experienced thiswith petrol before and my 829B ...thankfully without dire consequence , though that has sobered me a bit regarding the level of care required , as you have mentioned before , Niel , some of the old lanterns are"Gas Bombs".... Above and beyond what i have mentioned with petromax , there is an adaptor for an air pump , which can be screwwed on in place of a pump , this adaptation , which i do not yet have, has a schrader valve which prevents the fuels exit if the "pump valve"should fail... There are a few matters , the 2827B , which Petromax produced in WW2 was also a minimalist " gas =safe" lantern like the 829B or the Swiss army 250 , they are not as sure as a coleman , but they are excellent lanterns and can burn petrol safely if well tended and OBSERVED during use ..... RxR
Blessings , David ... as i say in my reply to Niel , i have had the exact same with tilleys and petromqaxes both , though to be fair to both those fine lantern makers , each time i had been negligent of the pump valve , leather , etc , High summer blessings... RxR
Two things here. Coleman lamps have the pump dishcarge air into the top of the tank so even if the check valves fail the tank will just vent air and the lamp goes out. Second point is Scharader vales are not designed for use with gasoline. The rubber seal will fail at some point. I agree that a Schrader valve does provide a fail safe option but I suggest you replace the inner valve insert with a Coleman valve insert. They used these on the 275 and some others I think and they will be OK with hydrocarbon fuels. ::Neil::
Thank You , Neil, for the pointer to that , I hope that you are enjoying the summer . Blessings , RxR
In fact my main problem with Schrader valves is not failure to shut off but failure to allow air to pass. I fitted a Schrader valve unit to my Unic table lamp because the Unic part was broken. Worked fine but every time I took the lamp to display at Ipswich the valve had sealed itself in and I couldn't pump air. I got fed up with this and last year bought some Coleman 275 Schrader valve inserts inthe hope that they are good for gasoline. We shall see. Not this year though because we are hoping to display all English lamps. I would say British but apart from the junk made in Northern Ireland by Tilley there were no lamp manufacturers in Ireland, Scotland or Wales. ::Neil::
