My old blowlamp packed up last week and I decided to look for another better one as it was well used and very old. I had seen the Bernzomatic ones in Screwfix and had a look for them on ebay and found this item . It arrived today and there is a blowlamp with a propane cylinder plus another brazing head for a mapp gas cylinder. The one with the cylinder is £21.99 and the other is £16.99 everywhere else. I bought a mapp gas cylinder for £8.49 from B&Q today and had a play in the shed and was surprised at the heat the mapp gas generates, enough to melt 16g aluminium or get a M8 nut cherry red. NTDWM by the way, just pleased with the service.

[Edited on 21/3/06 by Peteff]

my dad just got a bernzomatic pencil torch, propane one.

it's amazing. hard to see how we ever lived without it. they're well worth it now the price has come down some.

with that one on ebay, the price nearly covers the price of a couple more bottles. then you've got 2 more heads to save as spares, or relist

tom

Bear in mind that Mapp will gum up the valve if used continually. I run my torch on Propane most of the time and only use Mapp if I really need the extra heat. It's a very dirty gas.

just to dig this one back up,

being new to bernzomatic torches, can you use mapp, granted inermittently, with a propane head?

as in are the threads on the bottles the same?

i've a head gasket to do this weekend, with some very rusty nuts on the exhaust manifold. just thought a bit of extra heat would do no harm.

cheers,
tom

Years ago when I was in the fridge trade we used to use a bit of kit called a turbo torch.
It was a blowlamp that used to swirl the heat for want of a better word you could hold your hand about 1 cm from the side of the flame feather as all the heat was directed forwards.
Brazing 1 1/8" copper was no problem or even 1 3/8" with the optional flame guard
A brilliant bit of kit, anyone else come across them and know where/if you can get em.
Cheers,
Bob

MAPP is fine to use in propane torches in my experience barring the dirtying...

Turbo-Torch is still available, but the Rothenberger SuperFire is a nicer bit of kit. Takes the knocks and is easire to keep clean.

The Bernzomatic torches both fit the Bernzomatic propane and mapp cylinder. They don't fit the Taymar cylinders my old blowlamp used but they are a lot bigger and don't flare when you tip them upside down like the old one. £18 for two torches and a cylinder is a bit less than the turbo torch or superfire if you only want to heat a few nuts and warm spark plugs like I do. I can manage without piezo ignition as I have a 15p lighter .