THE Random Chat Thread - AKA "The RCT" - No shirt or shoes required - Open 24 / 7

The tall vent 200A in the first picture was with the 228 (my first acquired "big hat") near it.
The Craigslist seller I met at a run down laundromat's parking lot in a little village didn't want to sell the big hat seperate.
Poor little 200A looked like chickens played soccer with it a few years before it was tossed twenty yards into a barn for a few more years before a flood hit it. Then left a couple more years.
Had the wrong burner tube (an older one with tube and burner in one off a who knows what lantern) on it. And was bent the most I've seen one bent.
Told the seller I might get a part off it...

It cleaned up nice! And is a good runner.
Both were a bargain despite my for the first(?) and hopefully last time I didn't have exact change after talking him down on them.
Overpaid a few or four bucks. L.o.l..
Have under ten dollars into that 200A.
The vent is worth that , and if compared to E-Bay. I'm halfway rich!
Those old Coleman,s were many a man,s friend on a dark night.Kudos to you for restoring them!
 

Well thus day was a right off.
Went back with the Mrs car, again, brain dead mechanics can't feel vibration or sound.:dontknow:
The blurry glasses were to be corrected?
Noop
Just checking to see if they were the right prescription
Eye test in a week's time.
I guess my expectations of the world is too high.
Let's lower the bar down, way down, lower, scrape it on the dirt.
Belly crawlers out there running this planet.
 

Those old Coleman,s were many a man,s friend on a dark night.Kudos to you for restoring them!
Well thus day was a right off.
Went back with the Mrs car, again, brain dead mechanics can't feel vibration or sound.:dontknow:
The blurry glasses were to be corrected?
Noop
Just checking to see if they were the right prescription
Eye test in a week's time.
I guess my expectations of the world is too high.
Let's lower the bar down, way down, lower, scrape it on the dirt.
Belly crawlers out there running this planet.
So how is your day going, pepper?
 

gold.png
 

So how is your day going, pepper?
Stopped and asked for the next adjoining permission.
Guy shows me where all the cellar holes were, then asked me if I had insurance for personal liability.
Took my name and number.
He said he needed some roof repairs done, contractor showed up, but didn't have insurance.
I said maybe call the only guy the I would recommend William.
That's who was showing up to do his roof.:laughing7:
I said ask him if I am worthy.
Have a good day 😊
 

Thanks.
I lack before pictures. Or it might look like more of an accomplishment!
Some lanterns and stoves took quite a bit of elbow grease to get close to decent. So I usually get them running first and set them aside for my old age when simple projects are anticipated as being enough...L.o.l..

Very interesting history of the company. Bummer today with new owner(s).
Original autos ran on "white gas". Around fifty octane. Clear color.
Pressure lamps adapted to it.
There are /were kerosene lamps too. But are different in having to pre heat generators. Which early white gas lanterns needed too .
"Quick lites" evolved to "Instant lights" through design changes. (Allowing air to mix with white gas).

Here's a a group picked up a couple years ago.
There's a single burner stove (model forgotten already) with a heat drum on it.
The lot involved the wood handled reflector (appropriately red) for a 200A and the 200A. Cost of lot , I gave the guy double what he would have taken. Being a forum member elsewhere I wasn't going to be gank the seller. (And I made out fine.) I wanted the reflector mostly.

View attachment 2024642
Gonna Start calling you the Coleman King 🤴
 

Stopped and asked for the next adjoining permission.
Guy shows me where all the cellar holes were, then asked me if I had insurance for personal liability.
Took my name and number.
He said he needed some roof repairs done, contractor showed up, but didn't have insurance.
I said maybe call the only guy the I would recommend William.
That's who was showing up to do his roof.:laughing7:
I said ask him if I am worthy.
Have a good day 😊
Well I guess I am just too worthy.:notworthy::dontknow::headbang::hello2:
The landowner called back left a message giving me permission.
So I called him and I have three sites on two fields.
Oh darn, I will have to set a day aside to go digging now.:laughing7:
Told him that when they get to know me, I will do a full search of their home property.
Make a display of the finds.
 

Well I guess I am just too worthy.:notworthy::dontknow::headbang::hello2:
The landowner called back left a message giving me permission.
So I called him and I have three sites on two fields.
Oh darn, I will have to set a day aside to go digging now.:laughing7:
Told him that when they get to know me, I will do a full search of their home property.
Make a display of the finds.
YAY!:icon_thumleft: Good luck pepper!
 

Gonna Start calling you the Coleman King 🤴
Not quite yet...
If I had a garage or pole building for a total group shot , it might look like I have a good start on an interest.
And a lot of work , being I buy cheap condition stuff. Meaning....Rough usually.

I have 3 gas plants.
The bigger 460's weigh like 24 pounds. Max out around 55,000 B.T.U.'s.
They'll boil a fish kettle!
Don't know if I have the /a smaller 457 buried in the shed.
Have some older and newer single burners in varied models. And some suitcase stoves too.
They (the old heat plants) like the older/est lanterns and lamps use a seperate hand help pump to pressurize. Of course some folks (nonpurists)use an air compressor.
Let me find an internet picture of a 460..


201909201043262.jpg
 

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Well I guess I am just too worthy.:notworthy::dontknow::headbang::hello2:
The landowner called back left a message giving me permission.
So I called him and I have three sites on two fields.
Oh darn, I will have to set a day aside to go digging now.:laughing7:
Told him that when they get to know me, I will do a full search of their home property.
Make a display of the finds.
As long as he doesn't hand you a hammer and point at the roof! L.o.l..
 

YAY!:icon_thumleft: Good luck pepper!
Thanks
Just have to know how to name drop references.
This fellow does rebuilding restoration tractor work.
So who owns big toys, that are in my permission file.
Oh I detect on this farm and on X's farm.
"Oh you know X, or you do?"
Once the farming community knows I'm ok, the yes's come easy.
Though I had a eye on a place for 10yrs. The family died crossing the track back in the days of the Model T.
House disappeared from the landscape.
So last week I found out someone had torched it, bad vibes.
So the owner turned me down.
No worries, I know her brother. Great wood carver.
She said I could never understand how he could do such work with those big hands.
I said you mean those meat hooks!
We laughed with plenty of mutual respect.
 

Not quite yet...
If I had a garage or pole building for a total group shot , it might look like I have a good start on an interest.
And a lot of work , being I buy cheap condition stuff.

I have 3 gas plants.
The bigger 460's weigh like 24 pounds. Max out around 55,000 B.T.U.'s.
They'll boil a fish kettle!
Don't know if I have the /a smaller 457 buried in the shed.
Have some newer single burners in varied models. Ans some suitcase stoves too.
They like the older lanterns and lamps use a seperate hand help pump to pressurize. Of course some folks (nonpurists)use an air compressor.
Let me find an internet picture of a 460..


View attachment 2024725

I had a kerosene heater once. Winter living in a converted home made camper.
Sat on a 1956 Dodge 5 ton.
Well it was damp/cold I burned 🔥 it one night. Lovely and warm and well pleased at the comforts.
Second night came home kind messed up(F'd up) ran out fuel.
Grabbed another filled it up, and in a few hrs it was empty.
Wasn't burning well either. :BangHead:
So I grabbed the can of fuel, opened the lid, started to fill the tank (note to self, never indoors) Boom!
Well I had a Dutch door on the camper. Stain glass window on the top.
I ended going through that, in my full suit trap door Stanfield long John's.
Full on fire, roll, roll in the wet snow, 5 inches of West Coast Island slush.
Now I had a piece of stain glass lead hanging, enbedded in my left shin.
Camper on fire, me a tad scorched. Grabbed a bucket and got enough snow thrown into the unit to smother it out.
Sober/straight as a judge I went down to my buddies place and had him take the stain glass lead piece strip out of my shin.
Homeless, I slept on the floor till I rebuilt it back to livable.
Cause of the fire White naphtha gas in a kerosene heater.
Yes I had blonde hair when I was younger.
 

I had a kerosene heater once. Winter living in a converted home made camper.
Sat on a 1956 Dodge 5 ton.
Well it was damp/cold I burned 🔥 it one night. Lovely and warm and well pleased at the comforts.
Second night came home kind messed up(F'd up) ran out fuel.
Grabbed another filled it up, and in a few hrs it was empty.
Wasn't burning well either. :BangHead:
So I grabbed the can of fuel, opened the lid, started to fill the tank (note to self, never indoors) Boom!
Well I had a Dutch door on the camper. Stain glass window on the top.
I ended going through that, in my full suit trap door Stanfield long John's.
Full on fire, roll, roll in the wet snow, 5 inches of West Coast Island slush.
Now I had a piece of stain glass lead hang off enbedded in my left shin.
Camper on fire, me a tad scorched. Grabbed a bucket and got enough snow thrown into the unit to smother it out.
Sober/straight as a judge I went down to my buddies place and had him take the stain glass lead piece strip out of my shin.
Homeless, I slept on the floor till I rebuilt it back to livable.
Cause of the fire White naphtha gas in a kerosene heater.
Yes I had blonde hair when I was younger.

At least you didn't stink like kerosene...:laughing7:

Scary stuff.

With my affinity for woodstoves , I built one from scrap for the polebarn an ex owns now.
Built a prototype door/draft for another. Have most the parts for a build made also.
Salvaged Dad's stove parts off his rotted barrel. They need a lot of work to restore. Neat design though. Old Sotz barrel stove kit , 30 gallon drum. Thier auto draft combined with draft channel design caused wood to burn like a cigarette from one end to the other.
He heated his home and winter water for decades with it. Till wood cutting got to be too much.
Built a concrete block box in the basement and cut a vent above he regulated with a rug. Usually mostly covered in winter.
Water tank in the box next to the stove. Heat rises/gravity drove hot water up before cold in tank when hot line plumbed to it was opened.
Even cooked the Thanksgiving turkey on the stove at least one year I watched him take it off.

I about shifted my first house off it's foundation tossing a burning piece of paper into the firebox of a stubborn over charged fuel oil furnace.
Might have a couple hairs on the back of my left hand now , all these years later. It didn't like cold for many years.

There's a couple reasons I'm leaning towards an all steel garage build.:tongue3:
 

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