white gas(coleman fuel)=unleaded fuel

[captwoody]

I have a couple lanterns and stoves that use coleman fuel. I have not used them in 25 years. I was told I could use unleaded fuel in them so I am here to confirm that. I am set up for propane but for certain trips colemans might be a better choice. I remember heating tent with coleman lantern before bed and would like to try that again in my rooftop tent

 

[DaveInDenver]

It's been explained to me that white gas (e.g. Coleman fuel) is essentially just pure gas, e.g. distilled petroleum naphtha. I have used a gallon of it when a buddy and I ran out of gas in his 1985 F150 and it would run but we basically had to idle because it detonated so badly. So I assume there's no octane boosters added, for example.

I think the main reason you would not want to use unleaded gasoline would be that it'll clog and foul things faster being dirtier.

Oh, and I think the multi-fuel part is being able to use diesel or kerosene. Any Coleman fuel stove or lantern *should* work on unleaded but not necessarily all petroleum products.

 

[perterra]

Yep, it works but will dirty things up a lot faster. Some are hesitant to cook over gasoline, but looking at the MSDS of Coleman fuel doesnt give me the warm and fuzzy for it either.

I have an old Coleman 200 that has run on nothing but gasoline for maybe 10 years, hasnt really been a problem, but I have had an older 220 that seems to plug up the orfice rather quickly on gasoline.

 

[Lucky j]

Using gasoline with a coleman stove is not really a problem like other have said, but for the fact that it will get dirty. Like a small engine, if you keep using it, it will do fine, but if you stop using it for a while, the resin created by evaporation of gasoline could become a problem by clogging stuff.

 

[perterra]

Agreed, all Colemans (excepting their kerosine appliances) will work with unleaded. But you will notice different odor & may clog up faster.
If determined, one can run their gas hiker stoves on diesel or kerosine but its alot of preheat effort.

You can use gasoline in the kerosene coleman pressure lanterns, you just have to use the preheater cup as if it were kerosene.

 

[jeep-N-montero]

You can still buy ethanol-free gas, here is a link to the list of gas stations by state https://www.pure-gas.org/

 

[captwoody]

Thanks for the answers, I will experiment and see how it goes. Was wanting to use my back up fuel as stove lantern fuel when I did not want to carry propane .Coleman fuel comes in smaller containers maybe just buy one small and use gas as last resort. Have to get them out of rafters and run them then repack trailer with them as spares

 

[Tex68w]

I have the mid-sized MSR fuel bottle to carry my Coleman fuel in on trips so that we don't have to carry the entire gallon container.

 

[captwoody]

if lantern and stove were full before departing would the MSR cover 3 days of camping?

 

[perterra]

if lantern and stove were full before departing would the MSR cover 3 days of camping?

How long is a piece of string?

Depends on how much you use them, I have gone a week and never refilled a lantern, other times a day and a half.

 

[captwoody]

I have not used white gas in over 40 years so I cant remember how long it lasts, I remember carrying can just not if I used it every trip

 

[krick3tt]

I just scored a Coleman two mantle lantern at a Thrift store for $8, still in the box with extra mantles. On the box it says 'up to 14 hours of light on one tank of fuel'.
That may answer the question of how long.

Lantern appears to be in good shape. Now to find fuel, not going to use petrol in it if I can help it. My LR takes unleaded 91 octane and not sure how that will work.

I had one of these years ago but couldn't find it after the divorce. Hmmmm

 

[Herbie]

The other side of this "regular gasoline works but is a little dirty" coin is that real Coleman fuel is clean as hell. It is also super stable, and doesn't contribute to any "varnish" or other build up on the nozzles, etc.

My favorite Coleman anecdote was when my mom called me to come finish getting all my old Boy Scout crap out of her garage. This is stuff that had been there literally 20 years as I'd packed it into the rafters sometime before going to college. Included in that box of gear was an MSR Whisperlite stove and two MSR fuel bottles of coleman gas. Out of curiosity, I checked and the bottles still had fuel, though the O-rings on the caps were cracking. Out of further curiosity I screwed the pump into one of the bottles and worked through the pump/prime process to fire up the stove. Fired up on the first try, just as it had when last used. What a pleasant surprise.

I don't use white gas that often these days, but I keep a few coleman stoves and lanterns on hand as well as the MSR that gets used for snow camping (when propane/butane doesn't work that well.)

 

[Hobiecat]

The other side of this "regular gasoline works but is a little dirty" coin is that real Coleman fuel is clean as hell. It is also super stable, and doesn't contribute to any "varnish" or other build up on the nozzles, etc.

My favorite Coleman anecdote was when my mom called me to come finish getting all my old Boy Scout crap out of her garage. This is stuff that had been there literally 20 years as I'd packed it into the rafters sometime before going to college. Included in that box of gear was an MSR Whisperlite stove and two MSR fuel bottles of coleman gas. Out of curiosity, I checked and the bottles still had fuel, though the O-rings on the caps were cracking. Out of further curiosity I screwed the pump into one of the bottles and worked through the pump/prime process to fire up the stove. Fired up on the first try, just as it had when last used. What a pleasant surprise.

I don't use white gas that often these days, but I keep a few coleman stoves and lanterns on hand as well as the MSR that gets used for snow camping (when propane/butane doesn't work that well.)

Ditto.

My parents gave me their old Coleman a couple years ago and it fired right up, with a tank fuel from 1998. Hands down the best thing ever for car camping.

I'm the other way around though; I had a bad canister that leaked after it had been unscrewed and quit using them in favor of white gas.

 

[robert]

I still carry my Coleman stoves and lanterns depending on where I'm going. I've got several of each from various years as well as a Peak 1 stove and lantern. The bigger lanterns in the Powerhouse series will burn though fuel faster than the regular ones but you should still be able to go three days on a tank if you only run it a couple of hours each night. I always carry an MSR bottle with fuel just to be on the safe side and because these days the freakin' meth heads have made it harder and much more expensive to get Coleman fuel. If you are going to burn regular unleaded I'd go with real gas, not that ethanol crap, and I'd burn some Coleman fuel through it afterwards to clean it out. That or disassemble it and clean the generator assembly.