Helium bottles and Argon regulators

[garethp]

I've got a T size bottle of Helium from BOC initially charged to 200bar, its for filling balloons so I've bought a regulator / filling nozzle to suit and it works fine, however it has no gauge so I don't know how much is left in in the bottle and I've paid for another bottle just to make sure we don't run out over Christmas.

I can buy regulators with a gauge specifically for helium balloons but they're over £100 which I think is a bit steep when a 'normal' argon/argon mix regulator is about £30

My questions are would an argon regulator fit the helium bottle? I use fire extinguishers for the small amount of welding I currently do so don't have a regulator with a male thread to compare.

2nd Question is would it be safe?

 

[HMB]

Different gauges for different gasses. Each gas is molecularly different. An argon regulator will work but it won't be accurate. In your favour is the fact it's balloon gas so there is CO2/O2 at least 16% in the mix.

 

[voipio]

To measure cylinder pressure, and therefore get an estimate of the cylinder contents remaining, an argon regulator should be fine for doing this for helium.

For measuring gas flow, a pea-tube type flow gauge will give different readings for the same flow rates of different gases. Some of the laboratory grade BOC flow gauges come with calibration charts for different gases.