@presscall If it is just a case of drilling the orifice to .35 mm and adding a priming cup I will buy a cheap crapper and try this myself
@presscall @Thomas1 Alcohol light throwers do seem to inhale fuel at an alarming rate, they don't like to run lean. They don't also throw as nearly as much light vs the other fuels mentioned. Alcohol seems too volatile for my tastes, it wreaks havok on rubbers such as viton and I'd be wary on it running any do it yourself conversion with alcohol in fear of the seals failing and spraying partially atomized vapor of methylated spirits. On the flip side, it burns with no odor and due to how volatile it is, it's self pressurizing on some lamps that take advantage of it.
@Dashwood I know through being an avid blow lamp collector that they do consume fuel at a major scale hence the larger orifice sizes, if I did convert one it would only be for novelty purposes and would only be fired up for 10 minutes every now and again, you have a good point about the seals , there isn’t much that ethanol won’t break down eventually
I added a priming cup initially because I wasn’t sure that the ‘instant lite’ function would work with alcohol, but it did, so a priming cup was dispensed with. So just the larger jet irifice was required. We (self and friend I gave it to) haven’t seen a diminution in brightness at all compared with white gasoline. Regarding the potential effect of alcohol on seals, the spindle packing is graphite, the check valve is all-metal and the condition of the seal in the filler cap can readily be checked. If the seal in the shrader valve fails neat fuel will emerge from the jet on attempting to pressurise the tank before lighting. Failure of the O-ring between fuel/air stem and mounting threads will result in erratic running, presumably, but not a dramatic thermal runaway. The lantern is, besides, marketed as capable of handling pump gasoline and a measure of alcohol is increasingly in the mix.
Definitely going to give it a go eventually, I’m surprised the instant light function works as I didn’t think ethanol was volatile enough, I was going to use an old broken Tilley pre heater I have , I was going to cut off the arms and hold in place with a piece of wire wrapped round but if it isn’t needed even better
@Thomas1 One big thing to be aware of with alcohol is they have extreme affinity for water and will readily hoover up even the moisture from the air and float and sit out in the fount, accelerating rust and we all know how even 10% ethanol in RUG is already trouble.
Well after deciding it would be a good idea to try the lamp before the thread sealant had completely gone off, I lit it and guess what??………….. it’s still the bloody same working ok but still the noise, not as bad as before, so I disassembled again and thoroughly checked the plastic pick up , all seems ok so seeing as it has been like this from new I’m putting it down to a manufacturing defect probably with the pickup, if I held in the schrader valve and blew down the fuel inlet hole it took a big effort to get a small amount of air out the other end, I’ve done fettling now the noise will have to be one of the lamps quirks
@Dashwood what does RUG stand for, I know u mean pump gas, also the last time u messaged your name had the Israeli flag, now it has the US flag? Is this a site hiccup, I know it’s not important it’s just got me wondering
@Thomas1 RUG stands for "Regular Unleaded Gas". I'm still suspecting the eccentric has become faulty. Possibly warped or worn from use since it's likely using plastic components, thus explaining the "chattering" you hear. Fuels don't play nice with plastic, especially automotive gas this lantern is also advertised to run on. I only ever run white gas or Coleman Fuel.
I've no figures but I'd have thought there wasn't much difference between the volatility of ethanol and gasoline. Certainly both are more flammable than paraffin/kerosene. The other way around, surely - the larger orifice size leads to the higher fuel consumption...
@David Shouksmith thats what I said they burn more fuel hence the larger orifice sizes , I might have worded it badly
@Dashwood as an experiment I have filled my Northstar 2000 with super unleaded just to see how it works and it definitely doesn’t work as well as naphtha, I usually use Holts brake cleaner (after seeing it on here ) it is a very light, evaporative distillate but works great, and is the cheapest way of getting pure naphtha here in the UK
You did - it's a case of dependent and independent variables. In this case, and all other things being equal, the fuel consumption depends on the diameter of the jet (orifice). It's a bit like the fuel consumption of a vehicle will depend on the engine size - in general, the bigger the engine, the more fuel it will consume...
sorry, sometimes I’m talking like I’m an expert which I am obviously not. I am just taking what I have learned with the blowlamps, which are similar in the principle but not necessarily in reality, pressure lanterns are more complex with more parts and more precise fuel/air metering etc, I appreciate all the knowledge that the people on this forum have shared with me so far
