This is Curtsey of the:

Nothing happens when I open the valve 1/4 turn.

How This Part Works:

Turning open the valve allows the pressurized fuel and air mixture to pass through the valve body and into the generator. This pressure will then force the mixture up and out the generator tip. The tip of the generator has an extremely small orifice. The lantern and stove also has a "tip cleaner" which will poke out the orifice and keep it open. When you turn the valve open you should hear the fuel and air being released out of the generator tip. The below picture shows a lantern-a stove is the same.


For more information go to our Theory of Operation chapter.

Why it is Not Working Properly:

A lantern's generator is right next to a hot mantle, perhaps two of them. A stove's generator is right over a burning flame. All this heat is required but it also has a drawback. Many of the impurities of camping fuel, kerosene or gasoline is "cooked off" inside the generator and there it sits. After time it will block off the orifice-ultimately to a point where no pressurized fuel/air mixture can pass thought it.

How To Fix It:

The generator is the heart of the lantern or stove and that is why they are available for most appliances. I carry a wide range of generators for sale on this website but you may be able to find the more common ones at a good sporting goods store. Instructions for replacing a generator are usually found on the back of the package.

A temporary fix that sometimes works in a pinch is to aggressively operate the generator tip cleaner stem. If you have a very old lantern with a "loop" generator you don't have a tip cleaner stem. If you have a military lantern you don't have a tip cleaner stem but you should have a "pricker" tool. If you have a lantern with a "lever" on it, that controls your tip cleaner stem. If you don't have a lever, or if you have a standard stove, the tip cleaner stem is moved by operating the valve wheel.

So, if you have a lever, turn it around and around about a dozen times. If you don't have a lever or if you have a camping stove, turn the valve all the way open and then all the way off about a dozen times. The lever on the camping stove (up to light, down to burn) does not operate the tip cleaner!

This manipulation is going to probe the generator orifice and hopefully will clean it out enough to get the appliance running-for a little while. But, with this symptom, the generator does need to be replaced.