Using propane instead of acetylene

[PANHAPP]

It's not much of a plunge. Just a few bucks for a tip.

 

[notme]

remember your saving money from the propange being cheaper then acety but propane burns at least twice as much oxygen as acety....preheat times are longer..burn times/temp is lower so man hours are higher..imho you aint saving jack!

 

[PANHAPP]

Propane cutting doesn't use that much more oxygen. Have you cut with it? The drawbacks are.

It takes a just a little longer to preheat to start the cut

It is a little harder to lite the torch. I hold the tip against something, the work or even the ground and lite it.

I have wound up with an oily crap in my regulator a couple of times.

I think you can get a finer or better cut in light work with acetylene.

All that said I am going to get one of my acetylene bottles filled and set up a small sized torch in the shop for the first time in years. The torch on the truck stays on propane.

 

[dstig1]

I have no problem lighting the propane tip, but found you really have to walk it up to full blast in stages. With Acet is seemed that you could make fewer adjustments, but with Prop you need to increase one, then increase the other and do this back and forth several times or it will flame out if you try to push it too fast.

 

[Arc weld]

Propane uses an oxidizing flame so yes it uses more oxygen than acetylene. For large heating tips propane has the advantage that you don't normally have to worry about withdrawing the propane too fast. It's not as hot but you can use a larger rosebud so it kind of evens out.

 

[Reverser]

Do you ever have to be concerned about overdrawing it and pulling liquid into the hose, as is a concern for acetylene (small bottle)?

 

[Tractor Seabee]

Do you ever have to be concerned about overdrawing it and pulling liquid into the hose, as is a concern for acetylene (small bottle)?

If the propane cylinder is properly filled and not overfilled there should be no problem getting liquid if you keep the cylinder upright. If you over draw; the vaporizing liquid will cool down the cylinder and lower the pressure rapidly affecting your flame balance and causing constant adjusting of the valves. If working outside and using my diesel shop heater I set the cylinder so it stays warmed up when using the rosebud. That drops the pressure fast on small cylinders.

Ron

 

[Tractor Seabee]

wow never seen something like that!! Just uses regular pump gasoline. Seems to be able to cut through all the thick stuff and also very cost effective !!

As I mentioned in my earlier post; I have seen this product demonstrated many years ago. I was going to buy one but the only welding equipment vendor in Portland that had them stopped selling them because the prospective contractors at that time were stopped from using them by an uninformed fire department inspector with his own agenda. Then all of a sudden the advertising hype disappeared so I thought the product had died.

After these posts my interest peaked up again so I called them. They are alive and well. There lowest cost set is $1865; that is probably out of our reach except those of us that do not have budget problems and hanker for the latest and greatest. They have an adapter available to use distillate fuels also and recommend kerosene as it burns the cleaner than #1 or #2 heating/motor diesel. I am waiting on their Sales Manager to contact me about possibly representing them here in the Pac NW. They indicate that most large city fire departments including Seattle and Tacoma have them on their rescue rigs. There major market has been large industrial users, scrap yards, and fire departments. They have had a problem with reps as they do not want to be demonstrators and servicers of the product.

Ron

 

[PANHAPP]

Dave that is what I was talking about, If you lay the tip sideways against something the flame wont go out while you adjust it.

 

[woodlandfarms]

Is a regulator for Oxy different than that for Propane? I have a new victor set and I thought it said good for both oxy and propane....