>>> When you connect the lighter and refill can together the pressure in the
>>> can will force the liquid up the dip tube and into the lighter.
>>
>> Oops! Are you using the photograph that Bald Eagle posted to work this
>> out? That is a disposable non-refillable lighter. Refillable lighters
>> have a different construction. The refill valve is on the bottom of the
>> lighter in the section opposite to the dip tube and the internal wall is
>> the other way round. So that the gap is at the bottom near the inlet valve.

I meant the dip tube inside the refill can, not the lighter.

>> I am not sure that I follow your logic. Are you saying that initially
>> only gas flows then liquid?

I am saying that initially the liquid butane evaporates as it enters the 
empty lighter, only after a certain pressure has built up in the lighter 
will the liquid from the refill can remain a liquid as it enters the 
lighter.

> The pressure to liquify the butane is the partial pressure, not the
> global pressure, whereas the flow to equilibrate pressure is about
> global pressure.

Correct, I had assumed only butane in the system in my working...

> In the empty lighter, global pressure is 1.0 bar (btw, it's now illegal,
> should be in Pascal), and no partial pressure of butane.

...wouldn't an "empty" lighter actually be full of butane gas at very 
slightly above 1 bar (often you can hear the gas escaping but it's not 
enough to make a flame)? Or should we assume some amount of air in there?

BTW I call it "total pressure" not "global pressure", so still legal 
here :-)

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