Wick condition

This wick is a bit brown at the tip. Is this bad enough that it should be replaced?

 

It looks fine in fact it's not in bad condition at all I have 2 Primus 71's a 80 and quite a few petrol/gasoline blowlamps, and they all was in in far worse condition than that.
And I remember firing a few of them up prior to fettling and replacing the wick, and they worked fine with a far worse condition.

 

Not bad to be sure but now that it is out, putting in a new one will be no more trouble than putting the old one back in.

 

Thanks guys! I didn't know a good one from a bad one. I've never made a wick so this would be a good time to give it a go. This wick was wrapped in a brass screen, which I've never encountered before. Should I reuse that?

 

Yes

 

Just cut off the charred end of the wick and re-wrap it in the brass screen. It looks like you've got plenty of wick to play with. No need to make more work than you have to.

 

I would not cut the brown off. The wick is a long grouping of threads folded in half. Cutting it would make it harder to push back in, and the wire would have nothing to hold onto. (There is a wire as well as a mesh, correct?)
Yes, I would get a new 'bunch' of wick material from a 100% cotton mop head, cut to length, fold in half, wrap the wire, wrap the mesh, and push it all back in.
BTW, what stove is this from?

Ken in NC

 

Yes, there is also a wire.
I reused the wire and made a new wick from 100% cotton butchers string. If it's necessary to reuse the mesh then i will need to remove at least one of the strings. Its just too tight.
I don't really see the purpose of the mesh and my other Sveas and optimus stoves don't have it.
This is from a Svea 123...about 1970 vintage.

 

The mesh helps vaporization. The other stoves you have may have had the mesh removed, as others may have thought like you, or Optimus quit adding them to the stoves to save more money.

Ken in NC

 

+1 on putting a new wick even if it's just a little brown. If you've gone through the trouble of getting it out, you might as well get some sleep at night knowing you have a new one in there. It won't hurt anything, if you do.

I've redone a couple dozen of these stoves and have only seen the mesh in one of them, so the mesh appears to be an optional thing, since it doesn't seem to affect the performance of the stove.


sam