Who wants to talk torches?

[Hayley]

Pam - I guess it all depends on if one wants to change how one works in order to accommodate a torch. Personally I work very close to the torch face most of the time (about 2") and have no intention on working farther away. Moreover, I believe the OG20 you have (did I remember that correctly?) probably has better purity than the M15s. The purer the oxygen, the less carbon buildup the Cricket and the Bobcat tend to have, thus tanked oxygen works best for those torches in that respect.

[Nina"Sam"Hibler]

"I'm liking what I'm hearing about the Cricket as the center fire of the Scorpion. Pam & Sam (and anyone else who wants to chime in!), can you compare that Cricket flame to a Minor for me?

What I loved about the Lynx on my test drive was how sharp you could get that small flame when you wanted it, rather than having the large area of hot air around the flame like you get with a minor (and like Pam describes with the outer fire of the Scorpion). Does the Cricket/Cricket center fire give you that kind of pin-point flame when you want it? And when you use the Cricket with a larger flame, does it give you a similar performance to a Minor, in terms of how hot/how fast you can work on general beadmaking tasks?"

Katherine yes the scorpion/cricket has a killer pin point flame!
I personally think it is hotter faster than the minor.
again I'm on tanked o2- and as for the carbon....... clean the little darling with the o2 running everytime you start a torch session(cold torch). That works for me.
Sam

[knwadsworth]

Thanks for all the info everyone! This discussion has been really helpful, especially the comparisons between torches that I haven't been able to actually lay my hands on and try out. I really appreciate the effort to educate! Now to try to reconcile budgets with dreams, hmmmmm....

Katherine

[Hayley]

again I'm on tanked o2- and as for the carbon....... clean the little darling with the o2 running everytime you start a torch session(cold torch). That works for me.

As I mentioned before, if you are on tanked oxygen, you probably don't have any carbon buildup issue. When I teach at Arrow Springs, I use its Bobcat and it hardly has any carbon buildup. When we had ours hooked up on a 5lpm DeVilbiss, it carbon-ed up like crazy and now on a M15, it still carbons up but to a much lesser degree. It all depends on the amount and purity of oxygen.

[Vince]

Virtually every oxygen concentrator or generator does not produce pure oxygen so one does get less complete combustion and varying carbon build-up at the best of times as compared to using tanked oxygen. You can equate the phenomenon to running your torch just a wee bit reducing although it is generally of academic interest only and makes no difference in the normal use of the torch. The only indication is more carbon build-up on the face of the torch and that occurs only because of the cumulative deposition of micro amounts of unburned carbon. You would not otherwise notice it.

Vince

[PamDugger]

Hi Vince, Hope your life is happy. How is the great northwest?

[Jeri]

Katherine - I have a mid-range plus, but have recently moved to a mega-minor and like it a lot. It is slightly hotter than the minor I feel (no matter the oxygen source) and has a wider zone of heat (more akin to a mini-cc). It can also roar with heat for the occasional huge bead. Jeri

[Kendra Bruno]

What an informative discussion. Thank you Katherine for starting the thread. I have a mega-minor as well and I love it.

I also have an Italian handmade torch from a glassmaker in Italy and it's wonderful, too. The flame is nearly pinpoint, great for detail work and if I need it for some large-hole beads, it gives me terrific control.

-Kendra

[knwadsworth]

Dang it, now it looks like I need a Mega Minor AND and Scorpion!

I'd love to hear more about that handmade Italian torch. Can't help being curious, even it it's not a likely option for me. Is it the one shaped like a dragon's head, like Lucio had in Louisville? Or something even more mysterious?

Katherine

[Kendra Bruno]

Handmade by the Maestro who makes the glass for classes that we have in Italy and who made the torches in the classroom we have over there.

It's got a basic shape similar to the mega-minor. I wanted it originally because he made it and it was like what we use there...would help me understand more about what students would be experiencing, but I ended up loving it myself for work as well. The heat radius is wider than many other torches, but you can pinpoint this thing down to nearly a thread it seems. HA! The ability to go super small for detail, but still get what you need for a couple of medium pieces with large holes (I think you've seen some of those that I wear on pearls that I did) is great.

Best thing about it? He etches one side in English and the other side in Italian..."Love the glass and the glass will love you!" It's a fun torch to have and it's special to me because of him. Thank you for asking!

-Kendra