Funny. I have one, and it worked fine for a couple of home repair uses over a few months. Then, for years, it was adequate for flaming the top of creme brulee -- although it has definitely lost gas power. Recently, I used it to heat a stuck metal part, and I had to turn it all the way up, but it still worked fine. And this is years of storage in my humid basement. Is that what you're experiencing, slow loss of heating ability unless you turn the flame all the way up? Or does it fail utterly?