The first of my 2 new lanterns, an Ashflash 1010 in reasonable condition. I took it apart, washed and cleaned the parts, rinsed the tank with nuts and did the dance. I then checked it over again, replaced the filler cap seal and gave everything one last check over. It works pretty well once it's running but this is the lighting procedure: 1. Fill with fresh fuel 2. Pump 30 times 3. Open the valve 4. Light and watch as the lantern is engulfed in flames 5. Close valve quickly and run away 6. Return when the inferno dies down. 7. Tighten up everything that can be tightened 8. Check NRV... its fine 9. Assemble lantern checking everything again. 10. Pump 30 times 11. Open the valve a nanometer to let 3 mecules of fuel out 12. Run away in fear of your life as flames appear everywhere but not the valve, pricker, filler cap, pump or tank oddly. 13. Return when everything dies down and the mantle is glowing nicely 14. Wait 2 minutes 15. Open the valve fully and away she goes, burning perfectly with a nice white glow and no halo. Once it's running it's a lovely little lantern but it will be for outdoor use only and even then it will be approximately 30 feet from anything with a pulse. Actually it's already been drained and will spend it's life being a shelf Queen. I might respray the tank at some point as it's a bit rusty but there's no hurry. And just to prove it works, the money shot. I now know that the problem is lack of vaporisation in the generator and the fuel simply runs down the genny. If it had a preheater it might work but that's a bit wierd for a naptha lantern, surely?
PS I had hoped to get a much better condition Ashflash twin mantle ( a 2010(?)... if my memory serves) but it was refused permission to ship because it had no globe. Shame , it looked damned near perfect.
Maybe 5-6 pumpstrokes, eh... I've got one of these and I'm sure I've had it lit. Can't remember any particular drama, though...
As David has already mentioned, less pressure to start with may help and rigging a meths trough will not hurt and using a more bulbous mantle which forms close to the vapouriser will also help.
Nice lantern Colin. Every Ash Flash and Unimet I have suffer the same problem during start up, but once these get going they run very well indeed. I'm waiting on some brass tubing and once it shows up I will start to do some soldering so I can make some preheater cups for these lanterns. This should take care of problem. Granted the preheating will take a bit longer but that's alright with me. If interested let me know and I will send some of these preheater cups your way. Cheers, Norman
Yup, @David Shouksmith they are Chinese copies of a Coleman... kind of... anyway, I'll try again with less pressure and a different mantle. I have some preheater cups courtesy of a generous guy i know in the States @Norman ! And @phaedrus42 - it's interesting that it's a known problem on AshFlash models... well, some anyway. Thanks guys - it's great to have such great experience and knowledge to fall back on.
@ColinG The 201 preheater cup won't work on the Ash Flash vaporizer. The Ash Flash and Unimet vaporizer are almost twice the diameter of the Coleman vaporizers.
Ahhh, in which case I might have another one I made myself for larger diameter generators. If I find it I'll post some photos.
So.... I made a preheater from an Anchor one... It now starts with much less drama and with only a few pumps after an initial preheat.
I added a support that attaches to the central fixing bolt and the downtube section on the preheat trough just fits through one of the air holes in the base plate keeping the whole thing level. It does a reasonable job but the air mix is now wrong... lots of halo around the mantle so it's not perfect yet but I'll work at it.
If it were a Coleman exhibiting those symptoms I'd say check the fuel/air tube in the fount. Sounds like it's not passing air and allowing too rich a start up mix. I have a two-mantle Ash-Flash but I've neither lit it nor had it apart, so this fix may not apply. @ColinG If you're interested in it PM me. It wouldn't take much to convince me to send it north.
