Operation and Maintenance
Lighting a flat-wick lamp requires filling the fuel tank (fount) with fuel and allowing time for the wick to absorb the fuel. The wick is trimmed straight across with a pair of sharp scissors before lighting. With the glass chimney lifted off the lamp, the wick is tuned up and lighted with a match or other lighter. The wick is turned down if smoke develops, and the lamp chimney lowered. After a few minutes warm-up the lamp can be turned to full brightness. Extinguishing the lamp is done by turning down the wick and blowing out the flame, or by turning the wick down below the top of the wick tube.
Mantle lamps, and other lamps that use the "central-draught" tubular wick burner are lit in a similar fashion. The wick on a mantle lamp or "central-draught" tubular wick lamp is trimmed only with a special wick cleaner to remove the carbon off the top of the wick and to leave a smooth surface on the top of it.
Read more about this topic: Kerosene Lamp
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