Becoming Outdated

 Since family camping trips when I was a child I remember Dad firing up the Coleman 2-burner white gas stove and Mom, then, cooking up breakfast. The hissing, the fire, the smell. So when Wilma and I married, on our gift list was a stove for us. That one lasted 45 years and time to retire it. I've overhauled it but it's still getting temperamental. My quest begins to replace it, in kind. 

However, white gas is getting harder to find. Retail stores are phasing out these stoves, too, for the convenient green bottle stoves, which cost about a third as much. Finally was able to order one online for around $200. I tried to light it and it created a huge fireball. Got so hot that the paint on the stove caught fire. Enough pooled up gas to burn for a few minutes. 

Exchanged it for another and had the same result, which I sketched here. Raw gas spewed into the bottom of the stove. HUGE fireball 6' high. I've lit these for 55 years and know how to do it. The feed tube and shut-off valve do their job, so it's the manifold. Design or construction problem I don't know. Coleman is producing TRASH! I just created two crispy critters. 

I'll start looking on eBay for a used older one. White gas, Coleman 2-burner stoves and I are all becoming outdated.