Fill your lamp with Kerosene, you can also use lamp oil but try and use uncolored unscented oil. Colored oil may clog your wick and hinder full light output!
Most center draught's have a lift to light gallery, this was a great idea! You could leave your chimney on the gallery and light the lamp without worrying about breaking your chimney!
Remove your gallery, Rayo's lift, turn, lift. Plume & Atwood's turn while lifting!
Set your wick about 1/4 of an inch above the outer wick tube and light, let the flame consume the whole wick. Then reinstall your gallery! This will take a little practice to get used to! You can adjust the wick to keep it going!
Setting the flame to a proper height is a trial and error process. To high and it will smoke and possibly break your chimney due to the high heat! To low and light output suffers! You want the fuel to air mixture about the same. But still this is all trial and error, each lamp is different and all have ther own personality once lite! They will all require a warmup period, this is usually about a half hour or so, once warmed up set the flame and enjoy! Once you have run your lamp a while you will figure out where to set the flame for the light output you desire!
To extinguish your lamp turn the wick all the way down and blow into the outer burner shell or you can cup your hand to the side of the top of the chimney and blow, either method will work well!
Remember each lamp is different when lit, I have one Rayo that once lit the wick is only 1/8 above the wick tube and light output is very good and even! Another Rayo I have is more tempermental and requires more exposed wick to generate the same amount of light as the other lamp! I also have two P&A table lamps that act the same way as the Rayo's. I still have yet to figure out why this is?
Very important!! Never leave a burning lamp unattended!!! Never burn a lamp near flamables or drapes! If your lamp is on a shelf, always make sure there's at least 2-3 foot of space from the top of the chimney to the roof, a smoke bell on top of the chimney is a good idea if it's on a shelf! These lamps put off a lot of heat once lit and will burn your hand or anything that gets close to the top of the chimney!! Most center draughts are great consumers of fuel so Always check your fuel level before you light your lamp! Never fuel lamp once lit!!
Hope these tips help!
Enjoy!!
