Safety Issue

Hi Paul!

At first welcome to this forum!

Zitat

Original von paulhuffman
I have been an admirer of Petrmax Lanterns for many years and finally purchased the 500. I know that kerosene is the recommended fuel and some lanterns may have exploded when used with gasoline. But, how dangerous are these lanterns when properly used with fuel other than kerosene? I find Coleman fuel convenient because that is what my other lanterns and stoves use. However, I don't want to blow myself up. I would like to hear the experiences of anyone using gasoline or Coleman fuel.

To your question: there are two different types of carburetor for the Petromax: the first one is with an helix, that is to use for kerosene. The one for gasoline is without an helix, which is not needed to vapourize gasoline with its lower boiling point. You can change between fuels by using an other upper part of the carburetor. But the ones for a 500-CP-Petromax are rare.

If your Petromax has an helix-carburetor and you use gasoline, the pressure within it may get too high. Also temperature may get too high, and as the helix is just soldered on, you may imagine what happens...

Maybe someone here has a non-helix carburetor for you. I just own one, but this Petromax I am running on Aspen-4-T, comparable to Coleman-Fuel. And I prefer using that fuel compared to kerosene, so I understand what you mean.

Kind regards, Christian

there is a trick how you can use the helix carburetor with gasoline.
just change the 500cp fuel injector (and the needle) for the 350CP fuel injector (and the fitting needle)
The lamp then produces less heat and overheating the carburetor is nearly impossible.
(This is what I got from some discussions here and in other forums. If I'm wrong please correct me)

Hi all
I know this is a loaded discussion and I know a lot of users in Germany use gasoline in petromax type lanterns
I know it would work and work well
but in my opinion doing so in an unmodified lantern (replacing the carborator is not what I mean by modified)
these lanterns have no positive shut off and have a pressure release valve both are very dangerous when using gasoline.
and the matter of no fail safe check valve
checkvalves could fail and when leaking kerosene there is no issue but when leaking gasoline and gasoline fumes that could be extrimly dangerous!!
I heard some users have modifications for those - like special valves etc I will be glad to hear about them

The stories about exploding lanterns came up when the german armed forces used thousands of Petromax lanterns in the 1960's with gasoline fuel. Operator errors, like filling up the lanterns from jerrycans and spilling fuel or smoking at the same time created sometimes a flaming scenario. Especially when the device was in a tent or in a shelter the damage done to people and equipment was sometimes enormous. As a result the forces changed the operators manual, put some stickers on the lamps who banned the gasoline fuel from further use for illumination.
I use gasoline for years in my lamps(with all types of carbs) and I'm still alive. Just watch the normal precautions . Don't smoke or spill fuel !!!

Andy

Hello,

The petromax works with kerosene the same way than with gasoline - only the preheating-time is with kerosene longer (about 60-90 seconds instead of 30 seconds with gasoline), but thats all.

The swiss army also used / uses petromax lanterns a long time, and they used / use the gasoline version until today. These lamps do not have a "rapid", they are preheated by alkohol and have a straight carburator. With the swiss army, there is no information about any accidents with these lamps - only the german army guys managed to blow themselves up with gasoline-driven petromaxes.

Just to be complete, it is possible to convert a kerosene-carburator to a normal gasoline one: Just cut of the helix, but let about half an inch reside on the central piece on both sides. Press these ends together, and get them tight by hard-soldering them with a high-temperature brass welding (>700°C melting point) and a blowtorch. After this, widen the inner hole of the carburator a little bit to a diameter of about 5mm, and thats all.
Several poeple here in the forum (incl. myself) did this with the carburator of a 150CP petromax (the smallest one), because for this modell, gasoline carburators were never available.

Some time ago, i did some measurements of the temperature on a running petromax, and the highest value were about 620°C on the helix, the straight part of the carburator reached about 550°C, so if these weldings are made with stuff that melts above 700°C (normal brass weld), it will never get loose. The original helix is also welded with this type of weld.

One question to the end: Is it difficult to get a normal petromax in the US ? Can you buy it in surplus or army shops ?

Here in europe it is e.g. partly difficult to get specific coleman modells, as they were never sold outside the US - the majority of petromax lanterns were in anxcient times sold to eastern europe or india, and some modells are currently re-imported from there, because they dissappeared in europe long time ago (e.g. types 834, 835 hanging lanterns)

Greetings,
Frank.