How to Rebuild a Coleman 200A - Lantern Lab Episode 4

In this episode of Lantern Lab I strip down, clean and reassemble a Coleman 200A single mantle lantern. When you ask people to draw a Coleman lantern this is one of two they'll come up with. The 200A is the classic little red lantern. This particular lantern is dated 2/76 which is the same month and year as I was born so I have a greater attachement to it than many of my other lanterns.

The steps I follow here were originally outlined by Frank Bebb of Old Town Coleman. A lot of people would call this a "Full Frank Rebuild". You can find the detailed instructions here: http://www.oldtowncoleman.com/tech/re...

Any parts required in the course of a rebuild can be acquired from Mike at Oldcolemanparts.com he's a great guy, ships fast and charges a reasonable price.

There are a few things I didn't do in this video mostly because of time but also because I started with a reasonably good lantern that didn't need much more than a good cleaning. Often I'll find that the inside of the lantern fount (thats the tank part) is full of rust and other nastiness. Thats best remedied with a soak of some kind of acid aided by some mechanical action to help loosen stubborn particles, I use BBs inside the fount. This is often referred to as "The BB dance".
As noted I didn't do anything to the fuel cap since it didn't leak. I also didn't touch the pump or check valve. I did clean the outside of the generator by soaking in citric acid and scrubbing with steel wool, the inside got a small amount of cleaning when I ran a piece of paper towel up into it but other than that I made no changes.

Lantern Lab Episode 1: How to Light a Coleman White Gas Lantern:    • How To Light a Coleman Kerosene Lante...  

Lantern Lab Episode 2: How to Light a Coleman Kerosene Lantern:    • How To Light a Coleman Kerosene Lante...  

Lantern Lab Episode 3: How to light a Quick-Lite Lantern:    • How To Light a Quick-Lite Lantern - L...  

You can check out what else I'm up to on my blog: http://curtsotherblog.blogspot.com/

The music is "Hustle" by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under a CC Attribution 3.0. http://incompetech.com/music/royalty-...