Regulator Chatter

[carlosh]

I have a Victor CSR 260 acetylene regulator on my torch. Recently, the acetylene regulator started chattering. It will chatter even if I remove the hose and restrict the pressure with my finger at the regulator. It won't chatter if I let it free flow. It also doesn't stop chattering if I increase or decrease the pressure. I've removed the low pressure gauge and put my finger over the opening, still chatters. I've opened the regulator, cleaned the diaphram, removed the internal parts and cleaned them, but no help. The guy at the welding shop tells me that some Victor regulators do that and they don't have any way to repair them. He told me that he replaced all of the internal parts one time and that a problematic regulator still chattered. Does anybody have any idea what could possibly be wrong?

Carlos in Austin

[Zrexxer]

Hey Carlos,

Welcome to the forum. Sounds like more LWS BS to me - you're not listening to the guys at the Airgas on N. Lamar are you?

Something's worn... spring, seat, diaphragm. You can get the fellows at Sparks Torch Repair to rebuild it for you : www.victortorch.com , or they will sell you Victor parts to do it yourself. I replaced the spring, seat, gaskets, and o-rings in a Victor SR450 02 reg with parts obtained from them and cured a "sticking" situation with pressure adjustments. Repair kit for an SR 260 from them is about $19.

Is the cylinder at a working pressure and does it do it on other cylinders?

[carlosh]

No, it was someone at Alamo Welding that gave me that information about not being able to fix it. Now that you mention it, I don't think that problem was occurring with the previous cylinder. I did my exchange at Airgas on N. Lamar. Do you think it could be the cylinder? The previous cylinder I had was the kind that uses a T handle to open it. This one uses a knob located at the top of the cylinder. I don't know the name for the 2 different types of cylinders. Are you in Austin also? I don't have a way to easily try another cylinder.

Carlos

[tomtri]

Yes it could be the cylinder as well. I've had a few cylinders that sang nice Christmas carrols as they began to get to half empty (or is that half full?). Swapped over to another cylinder and the jingling was gone.

[carlosh]

I might have the problem fixed. I took the regulator apart once more. Inside of it there is another brass plug and inside of that is a small spring and a teflon washer. I had noticed that this washer was split, but I don't know if it should be split or not. I went ahead and made another one with the lathe. It's about .062 thick and about .18" OD. I put it all back together and now it seems to be fixed! No more chatter! I didn't try it very long because it was late last night. I'm guessing that it should not be a split teflon washer. Thanks for all of the valuable input you guys submitted.

Carlos

[Roger]

Teflon washer is often used on low pressure side of O-ring. They are often split at 45 degrees if thick or split so they wrap around twice if thin. Doesn't seem to hurt their function.

In your case Teflon washer was probably low friction guide for disc and retainer item 10 in this link. http://www.victortorch.com/repair%20kits/400.jpg
It might have been dirty or worn.

Item 8 probably has the orifice which disc (soft seat) seals against. (Item 10.) If you look at the orifice seating surface on regulator with lots of use it will have a groove eroded across seating surface by gas flow and corresponding hole in soft seat surface. If the orifice isn't eroded too deep can just replace disc and retainer to fix. Better to replace part with orifice or use Cratex Rubberized Abrasive stick to lap out the groove. I have also used a dowel with abrasive about like ajax to lap out the groove.

This is an O2 regulator so must keep all hydro carbons off parts including oils from hands or wash and rinse all oils off parts. This is why most places will not sell parts or tell you how to fix. If you can't test to know parts are O2 clean they aren't. BOOM
Clean room I used had to distill 55 gal. of solvent because it was contaminated from Dupont.

[Zrexxer]

Don't know about the 260s, but the 450's certainly do use a split teflon washer. yes, I'm in Austin, sorry for the slow followup, I've been in Bandera all week