Vector Thunderbird Butane Double Torch Insert for Zippos

April 10, 2019 in Review

I’ve previously made a review for a butane insert that I bought for my Zippo lighters HERE . Although the insert that I bought works, it left me somewhat dissatisfied. I originally bought the butane insert to solve the problem of lighter fuel evaporation with the original Zippo insert and it does a great job at this. I can’t say if the insert has allowed for any evaporation of the fuel, but there is definitely a good bit in there. Definitely more than what the original Zippo insert would have, for sure. In terms of fuel storage, I’m completely satisfied. However, I do have another problem with Zippos and it’s with their claim of being “windproof”. Let’s be clear, Zippos are in no way windproof. They do fair very well in the wind, but not windproof. Another problem is that when it’s windy, the wind really does make it hard to use a Zippo as the flame is natural and dances around a bit. These problems are also present with the soft flame butane insert that I bought. So, what to do? The obvious next step was to try a torch flame style insert.

I again bought a Vector Thunderbird branded butane insert because I was happy with the quality of the last one. This time, I picked up the double torch version. There are a few different torch designs to choose from but I decided on the double torch because to me, it’s the coolest. The double torch just looks insane (in a good way). However, one drawback of the double torch is the amount of fuel consumption. It’s not like you’ll instantly run out of fuel but more torches does equate to more fuel use, so just be aware of that. On the bottom of the insert is an adjuster that allows you to adjust the height of the flame. You can use this to make the flame smaller and use less fuel. You can also use this to make the flame a lot bigger and use even more fuel. This looks pretty cool, but is definitely not recommended for long term use unless you have a limitless supply of butane fuel.

So, how does this new insert fair in the wind? I would have to say that this is as close to perfect as we’ll probably get. The torch is so strong that wind hardly has any effect on it. This has made getting a flame in windy conditions so much easier and I’m not sure if I can go back to a normal soft flame after trying this out.

Another benefit of this insert to the soft flame insert is that with this one, you can have the lid of a Zippo open without having butane leak from the insert. With the soft flame insert, once the cam is flipped to the open position, gas begins to leak in preparation for use. You have to make sure to keep the Zippo lid closed when not in use or shut the cam when you want to keep the lid open. With the double torch insert, there is no such requirement. The lid can be open for as long as you want without any additional butane leakage.

So far, I’ve been very happy with this insert and if I needed another butane insert, I’ll probably pick this one up again. This butane insert comes highly recommended.

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Vector Thunderbird Butane Double Torch Insert: https://amzn.to/2G0qSLo
Other Zippo Butane Inserts: https://amzn.to/2U3pPzj
Zippo Lighters: https://amzn.to/2VyPIZb

Thunderbird Vector Butane Double Torch Insert Buy on Amazon

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Breathing new life into an old Zippo

March 28, 2019 in Review

I don’t think this is known by anyone, but I have a strong fascination with Zippo lighters. Now, I’m not a smoker but I do carry a lighter as part of my E.D.C. (every day carry). I tell people it’s in case of an emergency, but realistically it’s because my dad was a smoker and I remember him often carrying one. Now that he’s gone, I hold on to things like the Zippo that he used as a way to remember him.

Besides all that, I do have a major problem with traditional Zippos and that is just their design in general. Again, I’m not a smoker so my lighters get used far in between. If you’ve used a Zippo for any significant period of time and filled it up with lighter fluid, then you’d know that even without use, the lighter itself will run out of fuel because it just evaporates within the lighter. Zippos are just not designed for long term storage. Filling up a Zippo, you will only get a few days or a few weeks of life, at most, even without any use. Because of this, I stopped carrying my Zippo around because it would never have any fuel when I actually need it. I of course can schedule periodic refueling, but that’s just a big waste of fuel for someone who barely ever uses a lighter. All of that fuel would just evaporate. There had to be a better solution.

At some point in time, Zippo did come up with a new lighter and it was the Blu. This lighter used butane fuel and housed it in a sealed insert, meaning no leaking and much longer storage. This is a big shift in design for die hard Zippo fans, but I actually liked the Blu lighters. I never actually got around to buying one, but it was interesting. Now that the Blu line of lighters have been discontinued, I’m actually a bit disappointed that I didn’t pick one up. The Blu was actually my first introduction to a more modern designed lighter. It was a step forward, but it didn’t solve the issue that I had with my traditional Zippos.

Flash forward a few years and to a few nights ago, I don’t know how but the thought of a butane insert for the traditional Zippos came to mind. This would solve everything. It would allow me to use my dad’s traditional Zippos while having an insert that would be able to properly store the fuel. A quick online search and I discovered that there is indeed such a product, butane inserts for Zippo lighters. I immediately ordered one and this arrived, the Thunderbird soft flame butane insert.

This product is relatively straight forward. It just replaces the insert that the Zippo originally comes with. The main difference is that this insert utilizes Butane gas rather than lighter fluid.

If you go to THIS link, you will see that there are a variety of different butane inserts that you can choose from that are made by a few different manufacturers. Some feature a more traditional flame. Some feature the typical blue torch flame and piezo igniter of a typical butane lighter. Some feature a combination of the two flame styles. There surprisingly is a lot of options to choose from considering that I didn’t even know that such a product existed until a few days ago.

Ultimately, I decided to go with the soft flame option from Thunderbird. Out of the various manufacturers, Thunderbird seems to receive the best reviews and have the least amount of problems. The soft flame with wheel/flint combo is just personal preference. I wanted something that feels as close to the original as possible and this was it. I do plan on picking up another butane insert with torch flame soon, just to see how I feel about so I’ll make an update once that happens.

There are a few things to note. For those who plan on getting the same insert that I did. Be aware that once the cam is flipped to the open position, gas begins to leak in preparation for use. If you don’t want to waste all of your fuel, make sure to keep the Zippo lid closed when not in use or shut the cam when you want to keep the lid open.

Also, it seems like these butane inserts are only available for the classic Zippo size, not the Slim. If you use one of the other size variants, like the replicas, in theory the Butane inserts should fit because they all use standard Zippo inserts, but that is up for experimentation.

So far, the Thunderbird insert solves the biggest problem that I had with Zippo lighters. If you have a similar problem with your Zippo, then I’d highly suggest picking up a butane insert for yourself. They’re relatively cheap and can completely change the user experience for the better.

UPDATE

I’ve purchased the Vector Thunderbird Butane Double Torch Insert and have made a review here:
Vector Thunderbird Butane Double Torch Insert for Zippos

I also purchased an official Zippo insert and compared it to the Thunderbird insert here:
Zippo vs Thunderbird Butane Lighter Insert

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Zippo Lighters https://amzn.to/2U0pdPH

Zippo Butane Insert https://amzn.to/2OtQQuw

New Zippo Chrome Lighter Stylish Modern Design High Quality Popular Practical Buy on Amazon

Thunderbird Yellow Flame Insert (COMES EMPTY - NO Fuel) Buy on Amazon

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COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT

March 16, 2019 in Photography

This has been a very interesting week for me in terms of copyright infringement. Earlier this week, I decided to hop on OfferUp to see if there were any good deals on some camera gear. I wasn’t necessarily looking for a cage for the Sony a6300, but this one caught my attention because of the thumbnail photo. I had no doubts about it, this is the same photo that I used for a YouTube video where I reviewed the same product.

Screen Shot 2019-03-11 at 6.05.45 PM.jpg

In this situation, I just found it more funny than anything that someone was too lazy to take a quick photo (even with a cellphone) and would rather steal someone else’s photo. This should be common knowledge, but don’t steal other people’s work especially when it is used in advertising and for monetary gains. That’s a good way to get a lawsuit launched at you. Obviously, there’s no gain on my part from doing this because this person is only selling the cage for $30 but the advice still stands. DON’T STEAL OTHER’S WORK!!!

They say lightning never strikes the same place twice, but I’d say that this next case strikes pretty close. Moments ago, I went to check the business email that I have attached to this website and noticed that I got an email with no subject and just a YouTube link. This email was in my spam folder so my first thought was that this was just some spammer trying to send me to a scam. Against my better judgements, I clicked the link anyways and am glad that I did because it sent me to a direct re-upload of a previous review that I made for the Fujifilm Instax Mini 90.

Screen Shot 2019-03-16 at 1.08.22 AM.jpg

This situation is a little more upsetting because the uploader wasn’t just stealing one still image like the previous person, this uploader reused my entire video with watermark/logo and all. They even added their own links leading people to their online store to buy the camera. Going to the user’s YouTube account, it is clear that this person just steals other creator’s work and re-upload them in an attempt to drive traffic to their store.

As a content creator, the work that I put out represents me and my efforts. This type of theft is not something that I’m willing to accept. Of course, we live in the digital age and this type of stuff is all handled online. At this point, I’ve filed a copyright claim against this account and am waiting for a reply from Google. Hopefully, they see the obvious copyright infringement and not only take my stolen video down but reexamines the entire spam YouTube account.

I’ll add an update to this post when I get an update on the situation.

UPDATE

After filing the first YouTube copyright claim, it came to my attention that there were two other accounts that had done the same thing, downloaded my video and re-uploaded it to advertise for the user’s online store. I also filed copyright claims against these accounts and am happy to say that all three videos were taken down.

UPDATE 2

I recently received an email from YouTube saying how they’ve implemented a new copyright system where they are able to match my content up with possible re-uploads. After checking out the new system, it was apparent that my original Instax video was a lot more popular with these re-uploaders than I thought. A few of my most popular videos were actually stolen. Luckily with this new system, I’m able to file a copyright claim much quicker and was able to take all of the re-uploads down.

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Pelican 1510 vs SKB iSeries 2011-7

March 10, 2019 in Review

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SKB Cases iSeries 3i-2011-7 Case with Think Tank Photo Dividers, Black (3i-2011-7DL) Buy on Amazon

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Kodak TMAX 400 vs Ilford Delta 400 Professional

March 09, 2019 in Analog Photography

This blog post is meant to act as a supplement to the video linked above where I compare Kodak TMAX 400 and Ilford Delta 400 Pro. The main purpose of this post is to include images so that you’re able to better see the differences that I mentioned in the video. All images are as scanned and unedited.

Click on the thumbnails to see a larger image. The first image will always be of Kodak TMAX 400 and the second image will always be of Ilford Delta 400 Pro.