Perhaps I'm asking a ridiculous question here but is there such a pressure lantern that could safely be operated using any combustible liquids that would pass off as a fuel? I mean those which are still liquids at our 'general' standard atmospheric pressures and temperatures. Candidates to be consumed: from the most volatile paraffins(hexanes, heptanes, etc), acetone, naphta, aromatic hydrocarbons such as benzene, toluene & xylene, petrol, kerosene and jet fuels, diesel and right down to light fuel oil. And any mixtures of them. All within the same lantern. Unlikely, but is that possible?
One of the Colemans.... the 214 I think, is supposed to burn kero and white gas with little or no alteration apart from a pre-heater. It might even burn Diesel as well with sufficient pre-heating. Someone correct the exact model number if I've got the wrong one - I know one of them burns almost anything.
I don't have a 214 but I've got Coleman 237 Empire that's supposed to take both kerosene and gasoline(at least that was what being stamped on the collar). I don't think it'll do with diesel without the Preston loop. Not too sure if a Preston loop generator would be too much of an overkill for gasoline or white gas. Would this cause too much vaporization or worse, overpressures/ruptures on the generator?
@MYN I can’t see any single lantern operating efficiently on the range of fuels you refer to, unless you changed jets, and probably other things such as air intake: the parameters are far too variable... Tony
I tend to agree, Tony. I think that any lantern capable of burning a wide range of fuels without changing parts wouldn't burn any of them well - 'jack of all trades; master of none' springs to mind...
Its a problem that I've been pondering on and off for awhile. Maybe some ingenious ideas might suddenly pop up out of nowhere. Yes, without changing parts. It might be relatively complicated, cumbersome and not even be very practical. There's nothing I've figure out yet. But I'll still be keeping an open mind on the possibilities. Probably, something that could provide the widest possible range of fuel-to-air ratios would be required for that. Just too many other variables involved. Certainly not easy for Jack to master everthing or anything in his trades.
I've read on one of BriteLyte's advertising 'feats' which, at one point claimed or hinted that their's are even better than any Petromax (any year made). Not too sure about this. I might have missed something, but I don't see any convincing design features that'll make it safer for use with highly volatile fuels.
I'm sure you all will have realised that my suggestion was tongue-in-cheek. As @Tony Press said, 'there are none.' Henry.
Off course, @Henry Plews , But who knows,...the World's full of surprizes...a reason why I've always kept an opened mind for these to crop up when I least expect them.
Just a little curiosity, I was pondering a little on this:- What's going to happen if say, I incorporate a Preston loop generator into a lantern that could take on white gas or petrol(example a Coleman 242 or a 236/237). I could see that these have a positive fuel shut off valve, an air intake and fuel mixing tube design that's somewhat enclosed and I presumed safer for these highly flammable fuels. In addition, these have a tube in the pump that leads to above the fuel level and a pump stem operated needle shut off valve which are also safer, in case the nrv fails. With the Preston loop, even diesel could be used(not too long before it cokes up anyway). Just a thought....
Generally speaking Diesel doesn't perform well in pressure lamps. It will work in a Petromax although it will tend to carbon up the generator faster than kero and that is likely to be true with most burner types. I have tried it in Tilley lamps and it just won't work. If I remember right the best I could do was about a 15% diesel mix with kero. I understand the desire for a cheaper fuel but the hassle of cleaning out a generator too often means I am not really interested to find out how in performs in any of my lamps. Brings me back to what I have been saying for years which is to use the manfacturers recomended fuel in your lamps. If you want to play with a different fuel then buy a lamp designed for that fuel and don't fool around trying to modify a lamp. ::Neil::
Advice heeded, Neil. Its just a thought anyway. I've never come across any make that recommends diesel as the fuel. I'm getting diesel for MYR2.18 per litre from the gas pump, which is about £0.4142 per litre. Its hard to resist that..
with diesel that cheap just get a diesel generator and you can have as much cheap light as you want!!!
... Unfortunately, I've not come across any lantern generators(vaporizer) that're dedicated for use with diesel. You can have a coiled or a finned generator that'll vaporize diesel easily but at those temperatures, a fair amount of diesel gets coked at the same time. That'll be the inherent problem with diesel. I'm not really a fan of diesel in this case but its attributes(a whole lot safer with their low flammabilities, highest specific energy content per litre for any known common liquid fuels, available almost anywhere with gas stations and...CHEAPPP...) are all just too darn difficult to resist.
I think that @iwoo thought more of a kind of Yanmar Diesel-electrical generator. That will allow you to connect many electrical lamps and output lots of light...
That's what I was thinking too...that's why I stated specifically "lantern generators(vaporizer)" earlier.
If burning diesel is the goal, then I hope you'll all forgive me for mentioning wick appliances. I've burned diesel in my Dietz lanterns and Rayo lamp. Carboned the wick a little faster than kero but otherwise no difference. Aladdins will burn diesel, but the thicker fuel won't wick up fast enough and ~1/3rd brightness was all the better they'd do. At the time we were after heat, not light, so this was still a favorable outcome.
Not in the UK where, as fuel for road vehicles, it's more expensive than petrol (=gasoline). You can get a cheaper form of diesel for non-road applications but it contains a red dye which will almost certainly cause even more problems in lamps...
@David Shouksmith, I could see that its a rather different scenario here. Road transportatiom diesel has the lowest price per volume amongst all liquid fuels that're available here. We don't get the dyed variety (or maybe I'm not aware of them being available here).
@Marc, Diesel burns with a heavily sooted flame both out in the open and on wicks. Not particularly attractive to be burned as such, which a lot of unburnt fuel means soot everywhere and too much energy being wasted.
@MYN That's a shame, that's not been my experience at all. Perhaps the diesel in Malaysia is different than that here in the USA. If you turn the wick up too far then yes you'll get soot just like you would with kero, otherwise my Dietz and Rayo burn it just fine. Even the Aladdins burn it cleanly and without soot or smell, just at reduced output.
'Red' diesel is available for agricultural and commercial marine applications in the UK. But for lamps, pressure or wick, the cheapest alternative to paraffin aka kerosene, is 28second heating oil, which IS kerosene. It's ever so slightly different to 'paraffin', but performance wise it is the same. Some find the smell is different and unacceptable, others find no difference, and at current prices of 50p per litre when bought in bulk - i.e. 1,000 litres a time for central heating tanks, much cheaper than paraffin as sold in 4 litre pre-packed containers - and certainly 'white' diesel (DERV) for road going vehicles. Ultimately, it's down to what different governments tax regimes are applied to fuels and their applications. I certainly would not use any kind of diesle fuel in my lamps or stoves intended for paraffin (kerosene).
@Marc Well you can still burn diesel in a properly designed wick lamp with good upward drafts effected by the glass chimney construction. Its considerably heavier and oilier than kerosene. I could still use it during an emergency.
