Smaller fuel canisters?

[Steve Davis]

Hey, does anyone make smaller fuel canisters than the 3.5-3.9 oz varieties? Those are great for longer trips, but what if I just want one that'll last a few days?

[Jennifer Mitol]

That's called an alcohol stove.

[Jon Fong / Flat Cat Gear]

So, that is a cool idea! Someone should start a Kickstart program to develop a 1 oz, refillable canister cartridge! That should be enough fuel to boil ~ 8 cups of water.

[Steve Davis]

one of the current providers should just do it. wouldnt take much.

[Marko Botsaris]

Yeah, 'cause what we really need is a canister that has an even *larger* proportion of weight tied up in the useless metal part than the ones we have now. LOL

Easy back-of-the-envelope-enrico-fermi style approximate calculation, the proportion of the weight wasted in the meal part will go as 1/volume^(1/3). So going from 3.5 oz to 1 oz would increase the relative proportion of metal leaving aside the expense per unit volume of fuel) by a factor of ~ 1.5. Not sure but think that might get the weight of the metal more than the fuel before you even use it.

Also love to see how stable a jetboil would be sitting on that tiny thing!

[Jeffs Eleven]

+1 Jen

[Steve Davis]

good point. im just gonna buy a starlyte alcohol stove for short trips. how do i protect it? will it fit inside my mug?

[Roger Caffin]

> a canister that has an even *larger* proportion of weight tied up in the useless metal part
You are assuming that the canister will be metal.
I recollect that one of our stovies used a small plastic container for a little butane/propane mix. It wasn't JSB, but it might have been Tony Beasley.
The secret is to have the diameter of the container SMALL.

Cheers

[Marko Botsaris]

"You are assuming that the canister will be metal."

Only because I've never seen one made out of any other material. I had always assumed there was some safety concern, if not an outright regulation, involved with this. It would be really interested to see a plastic one.

[Ian]

Some fire fighters use carbon fiber air tanks so it's possible. I had a chance to see the aftermath pictures of what happens when someone puts 4400 psi into a 2200 psi tank but that's another story for another day.

I'd be concerned about the stability but I sure there’s work around for that like the legs Jetboil uses for their canisters.

My first thought when I read the OP was what's the point? If you want to save that much weight, use Esbit or Alky. Then I considered all of the fires and stove restrictions where you can only use canister stoves. I think that this would be a niche market and it would be hard to justify production for the lunatic fringe of backpacking but who knows?

If you aren't subjected to stove restrictions, I'd strongly consider an Esbit or alky stove to lighten up. My light trail solid fuel kit with enough fuel for a week, spoon, lighter, etc comes in under 8 oz and my TD with Evernew 600 pot isn't much more than that.

[Jerry Adams]

Bic lighters contain butane and are made of plastic.

[Jeffs Eleven]

^^^ …and are refillable

hmmmmm

[Jerry Adams]

I once left a generic plastic butane lighter out in the sun. It exploded. Little bits of plastic all over, some embedded in various objects. Didn't ignite. I had a spare so it was just a slightly interesting experience. I make sure and don't leave plastic lighter in sun.

Since a lighter contains so little butane, it's not that important. If you had a canister for stove with more butane, it would be more important to not explode. Plus the canister can get warmed from the stove.

With Roger's design, you wouldn't have to worry about it warming from stove.

[Jerry Adams]

A container of butane to re-fill lighters, like Ronson, contains 2.75 ounces of butane. I just weighed one that weighs 3.2 ounces but it's more than half empty, so maybe container weighs 2 ounces. It looks sort of like a Lindal valve with a tip inserted so it can fill lighter. The outside collar is the same as a regular fuel canister. Maybe that tip can be pulled out with a pair of pliers.

[Daniel Pittman]

I modified a 20oz pop bottle to hold the fuel and pump for my MSR Whisperlite. Works great, just don't pump it up too much or get it too close to the stove.

I wouldn't try pulling the tip out of a Ronson butane bottle… sounds dangerous.

[Jerry Adams]

Remove tip from Ronson – experiment for almost empty one : )

[Roger Caffin]

> Remove tip from Ronson – experiment for almost empty one : )
Or maybe for a totally empty one?
Hint!

I suspect the little pipe bit you see on many of this style of canister is actually part of the valve iside. Not sure of the engineering details, but I question whether you can remove the pipe bit.

Cheers

[Jerry Adams]

That's weird, it says isobutane on the side of the canister

[Rod Lawlor]

"I modified a 20oz pop bottle to hold the fuel and pump for my MSR Whisperlite. Works great, just don't pump it up too much or get it too close to the stove.

I wouldn't try pulling the tip out of a Ronson butane bottle… sounds dangerous."

This cracks me up

[Jerry Adams]

I am sitting here looking at that tip

Should I pull it out?….

[Roger Caffin]

Hi Jerry

> it says isobutane on the side of the canister
Hum, yes, now you mention it, I think Bic and generics contain n-butane while Ronson (only Ronson) uses iso-butane. Makes the Ronson lighters rather desirable. That could work.

Cheers

[David Thomas]

To introduce another concept to the discussion:

Small canisters become much more viable when they are refillable. I have a propane plumbing torch that is refillable from a standard 16-ounce propane cylinder. Before I got a selection of butane-propane mix canister stoves, I'd sometimes bring it for an overnight – it would boil 2 liters of water and was very cheap to refill because I could do off a 1-pound cylinder (maybe $1 per refill) or off of a bulk tank ($0.25 per refill).

Sorry I can't point you to an off-the-shelf option for that. But if you're really good with fiberglass, carbon fiber and epoxies, you could potentially make your own small, refillable canister. I've always imagined one that had both a cigarette-lighter fitting to take an initial charge of butane and a female POL fitting to take bulk propane with the ratio being a custom blend for that month's climate.

[Bob Gross]

David, you should produce those on a commercial basis, then smuggle them down to the rest of us in the Lower 48.

–B.G.–

[James Marco]

BG, good thought! Make'im work for a living!-)

Yes, fiberglass/graphite canisters would certainly be lighter than the standard 3.5-4 ounce canisters. Perhaps more importantly, they would easily achieve the pressure/tinsel strength. But, again as Roger points out, the weight of the container goes up exponentially the smaller you nake it (well, to a point.) I think it might have greater value as a reinforcement over an aluminum foil core attached to a standard lindal valve. I suspect small spherical containers could be made, but not inexpensivly.

The valve starts getting more complex. but obviosly, a spherical design woulp be the strongest per weight, necessitating an external burner, such as Roger's. I don't think that is the problem, though. A 2ounce container would reach approximate parity to what we are curently using, ie 2ounces of fuel would require about a 2 ounce container, easily enough for two or three days. Given the additional requirement of the standard lindal valve connector, it would remain within the standard. Well, as standard as they are today. These would need some modification for multiple uses, though. Likely a safety valve to prevent accidental overfilling.

So, at a guess, a $40 price tag would be on such a container. These would require a one time purging for use. The smaller containers would certainly take propane, or butane. But with refilling, I believe there is a requirement for a preventative overfill…at least for propane there is. These are usually small "floats" that automagically turn the fill valve off. An aluminum float would be needed. This mechanism will increase weights considerably.

[Stuart R]

Already exists, standard screw thread valve, contains 52g butane, but only available in France

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