small propane bottle refilling

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pishta

pishta

I know I'm right....
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Got the adapter today and filled 2 bottles. Works...sort of. The brass 1 piece adapter from HF ($17) or Amazon ($11) are the same thing. The OD threads work great into the 20 lb bottle, O-ring sealed with just hand tightness into the 20 lb bottle valve. The small bottle threads leak, no doubt about it. Im not sure if its not seating against the base gasket in the adapter or the 'probe' that goes into the small bottle is too long and is bottoming out before the rubber base gasket in the adapter contacts as read online? The gasket did show tracks of the bottle I screwed on but it never attained a tight leak proof seal. Im sure a wrap with yellow teflon tale would have worked but its not a huge leak and since your doing this outside and not smoking, Im sure its not a big deal. Screw on the fitting and snug it, hardly any is needed to produce a seal. screw bottle onto adapter and open supply tank valve. invert the whole supply tank with filling bottle attached for 60 seconds. Youll see the fitting ice up at the hissing threads. turn back right side up and turn off valve and unscrew the bottle. Done. Some tips are to chill the empties before you refill or pull a vacuum on a manifold set from them. There was a guy that rigged a 90 degree fitting with an isolation valve so all you had to do was thread the small bottle on like a water balloon on a hose bib and turn the valve on, tank was already inverted. He went so far as to defeat the safety valve on the small bottle with a valve stem tool and allowed the small bottle to bleed off the gas until liqued gas was boiling out the valve in order to get a complete fill. Not my idea of a good practice as I have seen the pathetic inverted schreader valve they use on the small bottles. Many reported that after they cracked this valve it would not re-seat or would leak. I agree. This is the design of the official Flame King "refillable" bottle they sell, you can make this with $20 in fittings.
flame-king-propane-tanks-ysn1lbkt-64_1000.jpg
 
Had a friend who worked for a propane company. He had this rig that you could use to fill up the grill bottles from a big tank. He had a special tank on the truck that sucked from the bottom to get liquid. If not you have to flip the tank over.
One of these days I need to make up one of those hoses.
What are you refilling, those little coleman bottles? Thats the only adapters I have ran across for sale.
 
Guy in a neighboring town got blowed up doing that last year. I have no details
 
How can you know you're getting them 80% full? Are'nt they dangerous as hell in storage if they are 100% full?? Just curious, thx
 
Lefty71 said:
How can you know you're getting them 80% full? Are'nt they dangerous as hell in storage if they are 100% full?? Just curious, thx
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You weight them.........with an accurate scale......and don't fill them as "heavy" as new ones
 
I've done this dozens of times. As an old HVAC guy, who handled refrigerants, it's sort of second nature. I have no advice for the sealing thing, the adapter I have is decades old and has never leaked. What DOES leak occasionally--while or after filling--is trying to relieve the blow off valve on the recipient tank. Just throw the empties in the freezer for awhile, and as noted above, invert the mother "ship" so's you get liquid

AND WEIGH THEM!! Invest in a few new ones if you have to to get an average figure.
 
MoparMike1974 said:
Had a friend who worked for a propane company. He had this rig that you could use to fill up the grill bottles from a big tank. He had a special tank on the truck that sucked from the bottom to get liquid. If not you have to flip the tank over.
One of these days I need to make up one of those hoses.
What are you refilling, those little coleman bottles? Thats the only adapters I have ran across for sale.
Click to expand...
Yes, Coleman bottles to refill my leaking A/C in my work truck. My setup uses the small bottles....
Here is an OSP valve with the pickup tube. The liquid never gets higher than the float pivot, sort of a carb float system. Extend the little plastic pickup tube 18" so it reaches down to the bottom for a refill supply tank that doesn not have to be inverted, make it a bottom feeder? (could be the vent tube they burp when filling?)
OSP.jpg
 
Just be careful propane is -44 degrees makes for a bad burn if you do get any on you get to running water fast and keep running it over it. It will burn to the bone. KB9GIB
 
Hm, maybe this could be a smart idea. Around here you can not get rid of empty Coleman bottles, just have to keep them. Well, maybe I can send them off in the garbage.

Bill
 
Bill, I had to cut the small steel containers in half with my band saw, and the larger ones a hole saw in a few areas around the container. I am thinking "they" don't want the risk of an explosion at their dump. If you do what I do...make damn sure their empty.
 
Dicer said:
Bill, I had to cut the small steel containers in half with my band saw, and the larger ones a hole saw in a few areas around the container. I am thinking "they" don't want the risk of an explosion at their dump. If you do what I do...make damn sure their empty.
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If the stores do not want any returns, then they should not sell them either. Can't they be refilled at some place ? I mean, it is a waste of energy and resources to cut the many times brand new bottles up in pieces to get rid of them. But I do understand you. I think I need to write my will first, before I start cutting in them. That sounds dangerous.
 
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