GTT Mirage vs Bethlehem Champion: Production Boro Torches

Short answer: The GTT Mirage ($1,975 on GTT’s site) and the Bethlehem Champion ($1,916 on Bethlehem’s) sit roughly $60 apart and compete head-on as production borosilicate bench burners. The real differences are not price. The Champion is the hungrier torch (Bethlehem lists 40 LPM of oxygen at full flame; GTT’s Flow Rate Chart gives the Mirage 55 CFH, about 26 LPM, at its largest usable flame), it burns four fuels (natural gas, propane, hydrogen, or butane), and Bethlehem pitches its low-velocity surface-mix flame as a soft, quiet heat soak. The Mirage is the control-oriented choice: GTT’s patented Triple Mix combustion, a flame range from soft and bushy to hard and driving, and a lower oxygen rating. GTT’s flow chart lists the Mirage at 10 psi of fuel at its largest usable flame, so it is not one of GTT’s 1/4 psi torches, and whether it runs well on an unboosted household natural gas line is a question to settle with GTT. Pick the Champion for raw heat and fuel flexibility on a big oxygen system; pick the Mirage for flame precision and a smaller oxygen budget.

Specs at a glance

Editor’s note: figures here are compiled from manufacturer materials and vary by configuration, fuel, and supply setup. Oxygen numbers are each maker’s max-usable-flame figures, not everyday operating consumption and not guarantees. Your manufacturer manual takes precedence over anything in this table.

Flame philosophy: crisp control versus low-velocity soak

Both torches are surface mix, but the two companies aim that architecture at different goals.

The Mirage is built around GTT’s patented Triple Mix technology: oxygen surrounds the fuel and is also injected directly down the fuel stream, so, in GTT’s framing, the fuel burns more completely for a hotter, cleaner flame. In practice the Mirage’s calling card is range. GTT describes a flame that runs from soft and bushy to hard and driving, and the two-stage layout, with a Lynx 7-jet serving as the center fire plus two outer rings, lets you work detail on the inner flame and open up the full 40 jets for mass. For the mechanics behind the combustion claims, see our Triple Mix explainer.

The Champion comes from the opposite tradition. Bethlehem’s own framing, and it should be read as the company’s framing rather than measured fact, is that its surface-mixed flames are soft and quiet, operate without loud noise or flashback, and that the low-pressure design bathes glass in penetrating, even heat. The Champion is the company’s redesign of the retired PM2D (PM2D owners will recognize the lineage), with reconfigured gas and oxygen ports, a ball-bearing scroll base that locks torch angle automatically, and stainless construction Bethlehem says stays cool to the touch. Four modular valves give you separately controlled inner and outer fires, so the 6-jet center fire and 30-jet outer fire behave like two torches sharing one face.

Neither philosophy is wrong. If your work rewards a needle-sharp, driving flame you can dial precisely, the Mirage’s design leans your way. If you spend your day keeping large gathers evenly hot, Bethlehem’s soak-style flame is the pitch.

Oxygen appetite: what 26 versus 40 LPM actually means

The headline spec difference is oxygen. GTT’s Flow Rate Chart (PDF) gives the Mirage 55 CFH of oxygen at 35 psi, about 26 LPM, at its largest usable flame, measured on propane. Bethlehem’s Champion page lists 40 LPM of oxygen at 20 psi and propane at 5 psi and 8 LPM at full flame. The fuel figures are close (about 8.5 LPM of propane for the Mirage against 8 for the Champion); the gap is almost all oxygen.

Three caveats keep those numbers honest:

• Both are max-usable-flame figures. Nobody runs a production torch wide open all day. Everyday consumption on either torch is well below the rated ceiling, and depends on your work.
• The torches run at different pressures, so LPM alone misleads. Community posters comparing exactly these two models on Lampwork Etc. made this point directly: the 26 versus 40 LPM gap is real, but the operating pressures behind those flows differ, so the numbers are not a clean apples-to-apples efficiency comparison.
• Real-world use varies. What a given bench actually draws depends on the flame run and the work; treat the manufacturer rating as the design intent and plan your oxygen system with headroom.

The practical takeaway: the Champion at full flame is beyond concentrator territory and wants tanked or high-volume generated oxygen. The Mirage’s lower rating makes a stacked-concentrator setup more plausible for moderate work, but full-flame boro production on either torch deserves a serious supply. Our LPM sizing guide walks through matching supply to torch.

Fuel flexibility: four fuels versus the household natural gas story

Here the two torches trade wins.

The Champion burns natural gas, hydrogen, propane, or butane. Acetylene is prohibited (excess carbon clogs the gas ports, per Bethlehem’s operating instructions). If you might switch fuels later, or you work somewhere hydrogen is the practical choice, that flexibility is genuinely rare in this tier. Note that Bethlehem’s full-flame figures involve real gas pressure (about 5 psi), so check your gas supply against the manual before assuming any particular fuel path.

The Mirage’s list is shorter, propane or natural gas. GTT’s smallest torches (the Cricket, Bobcat, Scorpion and Sidewinder) are the ones its flow chart lists down to 1/4 psi of fuel, which is why those models are known for running on unboosted household natural gas at roughly 7 inches of water column. The Mirage is not in that group: GTT’s flow table lists its largest usable flame at 10 psi fuel, with natural gas consumption around 2.5 times the propane figure. If your studio is a garage with a house gas line and no appetite for a booster, settle with GTT whether a Mirage will do the work you want on that line before you buy, exactly as you would check the Champion against Bethlehem’s manual.

Build, controls, and daily handling

Both torches are seriously built bench burners, and both give each stage its own controls. The Mirage ships with a 4-stud manifold on a powder-coated base with rack-and-pinion adjustment, and GTT’s two-stage instruction sheet (PDF) gives it six valves: red fuel, green main oxygen and blue secondary oxygen for each stage, set at 10 psi fuel and 35 psi oxygen. The Champion adds a swivel with Bethlehem’s ball-bearing scroll base that auto-locks angle, and its four valves give the center and outer fires one gas and one oxygen control each. The Mirage’s extra secondary-oxygen valves are where its range comes from; the Champion’s simpler layout is less to learn.

Community opinion, attributed as opinion: in the Lampwork Etc. thread comparing exactly these two torches, Bethlehem burners were described as more robust to bumps and shop abuse, while GTT torches were said to hold resale value better. One Champion owner noted the torch has to be run hard to pull a needle flame from the center fire, which is consistent with the soak-versus-precision framing above. None of that is measured fact, but it matches how the two companies position their own products.

Bethlehem rates the standard Champion for 44 mm boro rod and tube of 80 mm and up, and sells a Champion Sharp Flame ($1,928) with the same rated capacity and oxygen figures but a center fire that pulls to a pinpoint or a long driving needle. If the standard Champion’s soft center fire is your hesitation, that variant is worth a look before you cross brands.

Which one should you buy?

Buy the Champion if you want maximum heat and fuel flexibility and you have (or will build) an oxygen system that can feed roughly 40 LPM at full flame. It suits large, heavy work where even heat soak matters more than a scalpel flame, and its four-fuel capability future-proofs your gas decisions. The stainless build and Bethlehem’s claim that its surface-mixed flames run without flashback are comfortable bonuses, though the flashback protection your setup calls for still applies.

Buy the Mirage if flame control is your product. Triple Mix precision and a wide soft-to-driving range make it the sharper tool for detail-heavy boro. Its lower oxygen draw also means a given oxygen budget goes further, with the caveat that real-world flows vary.

At about $60 apart, price should not decide this. Your oxygen supply, your gas supply, and whether your work wants a soak or a scalpel should. If you are still weighing GTT models against each other, our Mirage vs Delta Elite comparison covers the in-brand ladder, and the Bethlehem lineup comparison does the same for the Alpha, Bravo, and Champion.

Related guides

• GTT Triple Mix technology explained
• Bethlehem Alpha vs Bravo vs Champion
• How many LPM does my torch need?
• Best torch for borosilicate
• GTT Mirage vs Delta Elite

Sources

• GTT: Mirage
• GTT: Triple Mix torches
• Bethlehem Burners: Champion
• Bethlehem Burners: Champion operating instructions
• Bethlehem Burners: Champion, the PM2D redesign
• Bethlehem Burners: technical information
• Bethlehem Burners: Champion Sharp Flame
• Glass Torch Technologies: Flow Rate Chart (PDF; largest usable flame, tested on propane)
• Glass Torch Technologies: two-stage instruction sheet for the Phantom, Mirage and Delta Elite (PDF)
• Lampwork Etc.: Torch upgrade, Champion vs Mirage (community thread)