I got a jet flame lighter from "Poundland" for yes you guessed it for £1 and they work ok for the money, they're refillable and come with a bottle of gas and at that price you can carry a couple.
Richard
Richard
Are there any flame lighters that anyone does recommend ?
Another vote for the bushcraft orthodoxy.I love my Blueflame PB207
I have a problems refilling my genuine 'Turboflame' what is the right way to fill them ?
... I'm coming up to my 7th refill now and the lighter has proved totally reliable
...as long as you equate pressure with temperature.
If the lighter is, say a quarter full, and you leave it out in the cold - don't expect it to light too well.
Put it in your (warm) pocket for ten minutes or so and it'll light fine.
The fuel reservoir has to be pressurised and you manipulate this with temperature.
Ged - don't forget mate - that every time you use one of these lighters you are depressurising it to a certain degree, which is why you have to gradually turn up the output nozzle ... so pressure is related to volume in a fixed space - and pressure (not volume) increases with external temperature (not the latent heat of the liquid - which I think you're alluding to).
What I found, through the various sites, was a way to maximise the volume (and therefore pressure) of the gas/liquid of the lighter at the filling stage
... then creating as large a pressure differential between lighter and fill canister as possible - so the lighter sucks in as much fuel as it can.
My lighter is the PB-10 - the upgrade to the PB-207. When the liquid volume has reduced to about a quarter full (about two weeks normal use) - I've adjusted the output to maximum to get a decent burn in average ambient conditions (and I know I'm a couple of days away from refill). If the lighter gets cold in this state then the pressure will reduce so that it won't burn at all (hence the warm it up in a pocket advice). Sooner or later you will still have visible liquid in the reservoir but the volume has reduced beyond a point where pressure is sufficient to light - refill time!
I know this is all pretty geeky
- but I had been frustrated in the past by failures of what should be a good tool
I think it worth noting here that certain cheaper brands ... after a while they just stop sparking.
Your physics are a bit off, I'm afraid. And ged is quite right.
Your reasoning about pressure and volume is only true if the amount of gas, in gas form, is constant. That is not the case here. Some of the gas is in liquid form and it will "boil" off to keep the pressure up. As long as there is liquid gas remaining, and the temperature don't vary, the pressure will be exactly the same either if the lighter is full, or if it is almost empty.
As the level of liquid gas decrease, the cooling effect of the "boil" as you release gas may increase, since the volume of liquid to cool decrease. And the lower temperature will temporarily reduce the pressure. Not the greater volume of gas in gas form.
I don't think so. This does not explain why you generally have to gradually increase the output of any gas lighter as the liquid contents decrease - whereas Boyle's law does...
Anyway I give up!
To all - just get as much liquid butane in these torch lighters as you can on refill and, providing the igniter is working, you'll get better performance ...