Opinion
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We’ve all been in a situation where a flamethrower could have been handy, right?
Maybe someone needs a huge brush pile roasted, but it’s pouring rain. Perhaps your guitar-riffing friend is putting on a concert, but the lack of pyrotechnics really shows how little he’s been practicing. Or maybe you just want to celebrate freedom and the American way by slinging flammable dino juice out to “first down” territory. Let’s not get bogged down in the why of a flamethrower, rather we should dive into the how of a flamethrower. Introducing the XM42 Lite Flamethrower.
XM42 Lite Flamethrower
Flamethrowers are in essence, pretty simple machines. They’re similar to the fuel system in a car, really. A fuel tank, fuel pump, pilot light, power source and go button make up the 5.5 lb package (sans fuel). The XM42 Lite is really just a (massively flammable) squirt gun for (safety-conscious) adults.
Let’s break down the construction just a little more. The pilot light is fueled by a < 230-gram butane canister, commonly used for camping cookstoves. The pilot is sparked by a piezo-electric igniter, which similarly shares a common lineage with camp gear and propane barbecue grills.
The XM42 Lite has a .3 gallon fuel tank, good for around 25 seconds of burn time unless a smaller diameter nozzle is used. The larger XM42-M (modular) has a bigger tank, expandable from .4 gallons to a 3-gallon backpack. Acceptable fuel types (or mixes thereof) are unleaded gas, diesel, and ethanol. The XM42 Lite with it’s top-mounted, gravity-fed tank can also utilize jellied fuels for increased throw distance and better burn on target. For wet agricultural piles, indeed. The whole package is run by a 2200 mAh rechargeable battery, of lithium polymer construct.
Setup is easy. Once you’ve opened the box and unloaded the contents, you’re looking at the flamethrower and the battery charger… that’s it. My friendly local salesman tossed in a butane canister as well, one of those small extras that turn a gun shop into a favorite gun shop. Use an allen key to remove the 4 allen head bolts on the bottom of the housing and pull out the battery. Plug it into the charger and a couple of hours later it’ll be all juiced up. Return it back to the housing from whence it came, plug it in and tighten those 4 bolts back up. Screw the butane canister into the pilot light assembly, fill the fuel tank and you’re ready to go.
Open the gas valve for the pilot light and spark the piezoelectric igniter. You now have an expensive blowtorch. Press the power button (left side of the receiver) and once the light is on, you’re cleared hot!
I prepared myself for the XM42-Lite. By that I mean I told myself to lower expectations, based in part on this being the least expensive commercially available flamethrower, and partly on a couple of videos, I watched where this was tested in bright desert daylight. There wasn’t anything wrong with that video review per se, but the visual effect is lost in translation when filmed in such an environment as that. I was expecting a squirt of flaming gas, fun yet not massively so. I was not ready.
The whoosh of the first fireball caught me off guard. It wasn’t supposed to be that big! Likewise, the flames shot out a good bit farther than I’d anticipated. I didn’t measure with a tape, but pacing off the distance showed closer to 30 feet than the estimated 25 feet. I felt the blast of radiant heat, which I had figured on. It was more potent than estimated, but it was only when everyone standing behind me started backing further up that I realized really how potent it was.
The XM42-Lite has an estimated “cyclic” burn time of around 24 seconds for a full tank. 24 seconds behind a flamethrower is a lot like 24 seconds behind a machine gun. You experience time dilation during the blissful joyride, then the abrupt stop back into reality when it’s over. It does not feel like less than a minute’s worth of fun.
Anything worth having is worth tinkering with, right? Given that the XM42 Lite takes three different fuels, it can be expected to perform differently with various mixtures. Above, I’m showing straight 87 octane unleaded gasoline, but as the dry season ends and the fall rains commence, I’ll be testing diesel and ethanol mixtures and possibly jellying mix for those stubborn, wet burn piles.
While few may find themselves with a practical problem to which only a flamethrower is a solution, that shouldn’t stop the rest of us from checking these fantastic devices out! The XM42 Lite is far more fun than I expected. I don’t remember the last time I got this much enjoyment out of a sub-$500 gun, nor one that runs only $2/minute on its maximum rate of expenditure. The XM42 Lite is an absolute blast. Now I’m wondering how the XM42-modular runs…
Live Inventory Price Checker
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XM42 Lite Flamethrower - Steel Gray | BattleHawk Armory | $ 595.00 $ 428.07 |
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XM42-Lite Flamethrower - Black | Rainier Arms | $ 699.00 |
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XM42 Lite Flamethrower - Silver | BattleHawk Armory | $ 595.00 $ 381.64 |
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XM42 Lite Flamethrower - Toxic Waste Green | BattleHawk Armory | $ 595.00 $ 428.07 |
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Author’s note: If you buy one of these, please take extra safety precautions. Bring a fire extinguisher. While we’re all good folk here with the best of intentions, it’s only going to take one major incident before these things are featured on the nightly news with the usual anti’s calling for a ban.
About Rex Nanorum
Rex Nanorum is an Alaskan Expatriate living in Oregon with his wife and kids. Growing up on commercial fishing vessels, he found his next adventure with the 2nd Bn, 75th Ranger Regt. After 5 tours to Afghanistan and Iraq, he adventured about the west coast, becoming a commercial fisheries and salvage SCUBA diver, rated helicopter pilot instructor (CFII), and personal trainer before becoming a gear reviewer and writer.”
San Francisco can use this to incinerate piles of human feces in the street
Yes, that would take a lot of fuel.
Stole my thunder
Sterilizing homeless contamination sites.
After removal of said outdoor lovers of course
Two words: “ANTIFA answer”.
Democrats will say it should be banned.
Except for the startup time, this looks like a great way to deal with a home invasion. The screams of the first perp and the smell of his burning flesh will send the rest of them running! OTOH, as the author pointed out, in terms of initial cost and cost of “ammo”, this competes with a lot of firearms. I remember, before the bump stock ban, a friend of mine with a bumpstock had some friends and relatives over at his ranch. He offered for them to try the bumpstock/AR setup. He told me that in less than 10 minutes,… Read more »
Browser46…..your wifey may be less than impressed with the turkey browned texture on the furniture….or the kids…after you use it in home defense. 🙂 🙂 🙂 Bill….you are at a loss for a reason???? ALERT ALERT Man Card at risk. You don’t need no stinkin’ reason…..same reason for a firearm…..it’s a man tool…because you can. It’s a “Here hold my beer and watch this” tool. ” at a loss to find a reason”…Eye Roll; Head Shake; laugh my ass off hysteria attack 🙂 🙂 🙂 Over and Out….On way over to Prepper Gun Shop site to order the modular model.… Read more »
Great for burning brush or weeds !
Clear your ratty patch of ground and disperse squatters in one easy step.
Waving the flame around above the target looks like it could be a reason for criticism. A clearing in the woods and shooting a flame around will bring the fire dept. out in a hurry. Otherwise, it looks like a minutes worth of fun.
I’m at a loss to think of any reason to have one for a person living in town. This looks like a solution looking for a problem!
Well bless your heart
Decent folks can be trusted with nukes(what a safe id buy to store THAT!)
Evil dirtbags cant be trusted with rocks.
Freedom is too dangerous for some folks