I know that someone posted a month ago, to say that their Aluminium Ducting had caught fire while they were torching. Well today, the EXACT SAME THING happened to me. :o :o :o
I was working using a bushy reducing flame, when suddenly "whoosh" the end of the ducting went up in flames and I had to rapidly beat it out.
In normal circumstances, the flame is a good 10 inches away from the end of the ducting, but obviously when you are working with a big bushy flame, this distance is much reduced.
So please everyone be careful - the fact that this has happened to two of us in less than a month would suggest it's a hazard worth bearing in mind.
I've now trimmed my ducting back a bit to hopefully avoid it happening again.
Scary!
Does the ducting sit at the wall opposite the torch then, I dont have that much space between the torch and the wall, dont use a bushy flame but it does whoosh a bit when I light it.
My ducting hangs down from a shelf above my torch but to be honest I wouldn't think it would matter where it is in relation to the flame - just be aware that it's flammable
It was me that had that happen, and now I don't know whether to be glad I'm not the only one, or more worried! As I'm not a worrier, I'll go for glad ;D
There isn't much room really between my flame and the ducting, the flame almost reaches the edge of the hood which sits as far back as it can towards the wall, and I don't really see how I can get it any further away.
You can buy flame retardant sprays and paints, I remembered reading about them in a paper mache book if you want to make lampshades. This company does a few. http://www.natfire.com/ It might be worth one of you giving them a call to see if any of their products could be used on the end of the ducting.
Sorry just looked again and I think they are in the USA but there must be uk suppliers too.
I have a bought system, which has the fan, ducting and quite a large conical metal end to use at the torch. Cutting a snippet off the end of the flexible ducting and holding a match to it is interesting! It's probably aluminised plastic. So I think this means that the flexible ducting should stop some way back from the torch and the last 20 - 30 cm or so should be real metal.