I have started taking a 237 apart to clean it and get it operational again. I am not sure how to remove the valve and cleaner rod from the housing so that I can remove the shield on the top of the tank. Any hints or suggestions? Thanks Murray
My best advice would be not to remove any more pieces than is really necessary as there is a significant risk of damaging the fount. Unless the fuel valve graphite seal or cleaning lever seal are truly bad and must be replaced, leave them well enough alone. (They are almost never bad.) In order to remove the collar (frame rest) you should remove the generator first after which you can gently squeeze the collar so that the slotted hole clears the valve spindle. You can also remove the valve wheel and pump plunger. After this you should be able to clean and polish everywhere. To clean the generator, if the brass spirals inside are stuck, remove gas tip (jet), heat repeatedly to cherry red and quench in cold water. They will come loose eventually and you will be able to remove them without stretching out the spirals too much. Once they are out you can heat them, careful not to overheat, burn off the carbon and clean with steel wool. Be careful not to damage the tip cleaner wire! Rinse out the generator body before reassembling. Good luck and enjoy; the Coleman 237 may well be the finest kerosene lantern ever made. By anyone. Ever.
Yes, these 237's are a really great kerosene lantern. I have one and also a 237B NOS (never lit it - yet). They really put out some serious light and heat! Enjoy!
Playing ball with the puppy! That's great, really! I have a puppy, too. Her name is Greta and she's a beautiful Rottweiler, weighting in at 125 pounds! God, I don't know what my wife and I were thinking when we got her but now the wife doesn't want to part with her. Happy New Year!!
Thanks for that advice, I loosened the nuts off the valve and cleaner but didn't want to force them anymore so I will leave them as is. I wanted to get that shield off so I could do a proper cleaning and I will try what you suggest. Appreciate the suggestions. Murray
I fell into the trap of stretching mine as they become very soft. If that happens then you can rewind them on suitable sized screw driver shafts. Even so it's a bit of a pain getting one back inside the other again!
Use a wrench to unscrew the the fuel valve wheel assembly, allowing the needle to rotate out as well. Use a wrench to unscrew the pricker cam assembly and unhook the pricker from the cam. The fount rest can be removed now, or at the fuel wheel stage by slipping it over the pricker actuator. I generally remove fuel tubes as well as they can beome quite clogged. This also allows you to remove rust from the fount with pressure. Ian
If you do decide to remove the valve body from the fount, be very careful. The valve body thread is sealed in the bung and it is very easy to bend the thin brass around the bung when unscrewing the valve body. There is a special clamp to hold the fount steady while you exert torque with a long lever or pipe on the valve. You should not apply too much heat to the threads as the bung is soft soldered into the fount. DANGER AHEAD!!
The better way would be to clamp the valve body securely in a vice and then turn the tank with bare hands. But as mentioned before: if it's not broken don't fix it! And maybe it's enough to rinse the tank & fuel pickup with some paint thinner etc. to remove the residues.
Thanks everyone for all the advice. There is a gentleman who lives about 2 hours from me and he has worked on Coleman products for many years. He is basically the only one left in that business in Canada and I have spoken with him recently. He has offered for me to come to his shop for a day and he will train me on rebuilding one of my older Coleman lanterns and pressure test it. I plan to do that this week and am really looking forward to it. Despite having a number of Coleman lanterns from the 60s to 80s., I am rather inexperienced on fettling them and I am eager to learn more. I have used these lanterns for camping and hunting and now want to get them all back into a "like new" and useable condition. I will try and update on how I am progressing. Thanks again Murray
I just got home tonight from spending the day with a gentleman who helped me rebuild my two kerosene Coleman Canada 237 lanterns. This fellow is very knowledgeable about old Coleman lanterns and is also a great teacher. We completely stripped the lanterns down, cleaned them, flushed the tanks and replaced missing and or damaged parts and pressure tested them. Two new globes, new mantles, one new generator, new graphite bushings, a few other small parts and they are now ready to fire up. I will try and do that tomorrow and take some photos to post. Cheers Murray
Hi murrayg, I know that this is a very old thread.... can you share any tips learned from the gentleman about rebuilding a Coleman 237?
Hi @toobs Welcome to the forum. As you said this is an old post so you may not necessarily achieve an answer from the original postee. If you wish to attract a particular person do as follows: @murrayg and it will flag him if he is still active. Should you have no luck post your specific questions here and someone will come up with the answer, lots of experience here! Regards Jeremy
@murrayg You’re in good hands, @phaedrus42 has given top advice. These lanterns are great performers and will give you years of service. Looking forward to seeing the money shot. Cheers Pete
Hi Jeremy @X246A , thanks for the welcome and the tip on how to flag a guy in this forum :-) Thanks @JEFF JOHNSON for the welcome :-) Hi @Tony Press , will definitely checkout that link :-) I joined and have been lurking this forum since January of 2015. I came across this forum when I was looking for more information on lanterns that I plan to include in my disaster preparedness kit. As you might have heard, here in the Philippines typhoons are a common thing every year. Coleman whitegas is not locally available but we have an abundant supply of kerosene which could be purchase on almost all gas stations being sold at around $1 per liter or $3.78 per gallon. This has prompted me to look for kerosene lanterns specifically Coleman 237 and 214 from the bay back in 2015. But I have been busy at work and my 237's were kept in storage. Now with this lockdown due to Covid19, I finally got a chance to do some fiddling on my lanterns. I have successfully repaired 2 units of 237 in good working order. But later found out that one unit has a badly rusted fount which is now filled up with evaporust and waiting for assembly. Hi @AussiePete, here are pictures of the work in progress....
Hi @phaedrus42 , this is the best summarized instruction for disassembling a Coleman 237. This helped me a lot particularly this advise "not to remove any more pieces than is really necessary". "there is a significant risk of damaging the fount". Can you expound on this? what kind of damaged that we risk to the fount? Thank you very much!!!
Welcome @toobs You have a nice workplace and the 237's looking fine. Its great to have Evaporust being available. If the control valve isn't blocked and functional, its not absolutely necessary to remove it from the fount. The upper part of the 237's fount is quite thin. If the valves tight-stuck, trying to twist it out by force might deform or damage the fount's upper section. I guess the Covid-19 pandemic has gotten some of us into sone extra fettling.
"there is a significant risk of damaging the fount". Can you expound on this? what kind of damaged that we risk to the fount?
Coleman lanterns with brass tanks can easily bend where the pick up tube goes into the top of the tank if too much twisting action it used and your tool is not exactly 90 degrees in relation to the tank. In other words you can twist up the top of the tank. This can also apply to steel tanks as well but brass seems to be more susceptible. Have I made myself totally unclear (as usual)? -#
@george Makes sense to me, nearly been there myself. As luck would have I backed off before any damage could be done, I felt it flexing while trying to remove the valve assembly from the top of the tank.
@Alex Smith Thanks, Alex! Sanity check here... If I'm lucky enough to get the fuel tube out, I usually put it back in using just a little loc-tite on it to seal it as well as enable you to "index" it. You can still bend the hell out of it just trying to get it to line up correctly! However, the loc-tite will seal it so you really don't have to use a lot of heavy twisting and worry about it leaking. These tubes are "tapered" so you really don't need sealer but Coleman used it anyway.
Thanks @MYN, I actually imported the Evaporust from the US since it is not locally available in Manila. Thanks @george, like @Alex Smith I also felt the valve assembly flexing but I was unsure why it is behaving that way. It was only when @phaedrus42 explained that the thin brass around the bung can get easily bent. I almost destroyed a 237 lantern and luckily I did not forced it. Thanks for all your advise! Be safe!
