@Paul Aslanides regarding the "choofing" sound. I had that with a Phoebus 30 I have. Choofing like a steam coal train for a couple seconds...single or double burst of it. Sometimes a few at a a time in a row. Figured mine out...when one of the choofs plugged the jet partially. It ended up being old black looking carbon build up inside the burner itself. It must be pieces of it breaking off and making it way down the burner head. Put my burner in a vise held firm but not tight...jet removed....used a torch to bring the whole burner head and tubes to a slight glow of dull red and then took a compressor and blew from the bottom. TONS of sparkly crap came out. Allowed to cool...washed the burner out with carburetor cleaner. Choofing gone.
@Remus1956 Aha ! Must be just what my burner needs. I'm just scared to dismantle the regulator, (with its built-in pricker), and then to reassemble it correctly after the decoke. What type of torch did you use ? Kerosene Blowtorch, Propane Blowtorch, or Oxy-Acetylene Torch (carefully) ? Thanks.
@Paul Aslanides I just used propane and brought to the lowest glow to no glow at all. When you see smoke and all then you know it's time. The choofing for me was fixed right away. You can even get a small wire and prod it from the bottom (you'll see two tubes... Mine were almost plugged. Lots of rinsing and poking from the bottom too. Also check inside the tank. Might have crap in there too. Alternative is citric acid but you do not want to overdue it and turn the brass pink.
Thie is a spare Radius burner (which came with the stove) set up for decarbonization. It has ' Radius Ltd ', ' Sweden ', and Arabic script in raised lettering under the fixed cup. The control gland was blanked off to prevent loss of air during the burning operation. (Thread is 1/8 x 27 NPST).
After the burnout, on reassembly, much difficulty in engaging the pricker rack to the pinion. Gave up but next day got it in o.k. easily. You have to jiggle things with your third hand to get them to fall into place. There was no packing in the gland, just the small ring which has an internal chamfer on one side, similar to that on some Coleman Lanterns. So I assume that the ring goes in last, before the nut is screwed in ? I tried that, but I think some of the graphite packing got past the thread and pinion, and prevented the taper from shutting off the flow. Cleaned that out, and reassembled, this time with the small ring onto the shaft first, up against the thread of the shaft, or control rod, but still no shutoff when the control shaft is turned Clockwise. i.e. no regulator control from full flame down to simmer. I now suspect that the rack has engaged the pinion one tooth out, so that the base of the pricker is bottoming out in the casting, No ? When the control rod is turned Anticlockwise the pricker wire (12 thou diameter) is about 1.5 to 2 m/m through the jet. That might equate to the distance between the teeth of the rack ? Any advice will be most welcome. Thanks. There must be some standard modus operandi for this assembly.
Paul, First check that the fuel can be stopped with the rack removed. If not the taper on the end of the spindle needs attention. Clean the taper with some very fine emery paper. This is for an 8R but the procedure is the same for most regulated burmers.
@ROBBO55 Marvellous ! Many thanks, Martin. Yes, I have carefully lapped the taper - it's good. I've been using a pair of tweezers to put the rack in, but have no control over the angle of entry/engagement with the pinion. Off to the stationer's tomorrow to buy the correct pencil. ( I threw them out years ago and now have 4 B pencils throughout the house, the lead is darker and easier to read ). I've worked out that the rack is stopped against the base, or inside, of the nipple - when the control wheel is turned fully clockwise - because the rack is engaged too high. This prevents the taper from fully mating with the cone, i.e. it limits the lateral travel of the spindle. It also explains why there is approx 2 m/m of pricker wire through the nipple. Er, seems to depend on the position of the control wheel when engaging the rack. So I'll remove the rack and check for full shut off. Good idea. There was just over 180 degrees of arc of the control wheel before dismantling. This could be due to general wear of the pinion and the loose fit of the R clip joining the control shaft to the spindle. What I really need to know now is - does the small, chamfered ring go onto the spindle first, then the graphite packing ? Seems to me to be the right way, as the turned end of the gland nut is quite sufficient to compress the graphite. Or does the packing go in first, then the ring, then the gland nut ? Thanks. Paul.
@Paul Aslanides From a Radius catalogue posted by @optipri: [https://classiccampstoves.com/threads/1950s-mid-radius-range-250.17301/] Brass ring goes on before packing graphite. The Reference Library is very useful… Cheers Tony
Any movement beyond 180 degrees use to be caused by too low needle, preventing proper shut-off. Most burners in this style have slightly less than 180 degrees turning range while a few odd versions could be around 120 degrees.
Preparing a second Radius burner for a decoke, the small cylinder of graphite crumbled to fragments on removal of the spindle from the burner casting. The small Coleman packing, PO 2, ( USD $3.35 each ), has a 3/16" bore diameter. The Radius spindle shaft is 5 m/m diameter - that's 9 thou bigger than 3/16". [ 0.1969 minus 0.1875 = .0094" ]. So I'm wondering if the Coleman graphite cylinder bore could be opened out to fit the 5 m/m spindle/shaft of the Radius ? Sounds like a ticklish job - graphite is so slippery. Unless the Radius packing is easily obtainable ? Otherwise, it's cut and pack small pieces from a strip of graphite. Anyone tried modifying a graphite bush ? Thanks.
@Paul Aslanides I’m thinking that you could gently hand-run a 5 mm drill through? I’ve recently had the need to reduce the outer diameter of two graphite packing rings - by hand on 600 wet/dry. Yes, it’s slippery!
Paul, I haven't tried but I can't see why not. It doesn't have to be a neat fit. Using a small "Rat Tail" file with care. Or using your fingers to twist a 5mm drill through the centre with care. Doesn't realy matter if it cracks, it is going to be compressed anyway .
in regards to the little ring @Paul Aslanides you will notice there are two sides of it. A flat side and a concaved side. The concaved side goes against the threads on the spindle and the flat side matches the packing nut flat side with the graphite in the middle.
