Esbit burner testing

[Dan Yeruski]

Thank you Aaron, I dislike making videos also :)

I need to get a Ti bowl like you have. That might be the ticket to sweetsville.

Also need to order more 4 gram esbit. It will all come together someday. 8 gram boil on the way!!!

[Bob Gross]

Aaron's bowl handle looked interesting. I use the same Snow Peak bowl, but I had mounted a stainless steel wire bail on it.

–B.G.–

[Aaron Sorensen]

The rolled top holds that handle very well and only adds .2oz.

[Eric Blumensaadt]

Bob,

Yer keerect about the definition of "boil"' as a Full Boil would be when then entire water surface is involved in boiling but anything less could be many seconds to a minute less time.

So I'll say let's time "First Boil" of bubbles breaking on the surface to "Full Boil". That should cover the situation.

Or we could use a decent kitchen thermometer (digital preferred) for what the center of the pot boil temp would be AT THE ALTITUDE TESTED.

Nice writeup on your test. That's what I'm talking' about!

[Bob Moulder]

So I'll say let's time "First Boil" of bubbles breaking on the surface

Sounds reasonable… it really takes a lot of extra energy for those last few degrees, and 200°F is plenty hot.

[Bob Moulder]

What's the best place to get them?

[Jameson Tisch]

I mainly never reach a full boil when on the trail as you're correct Bob that it does take a long time/large amount of energy relatively to get that last 10 degrees or so for a full boil. Obviously for testing purposes though and trying to set a standard a true boil would be needed for accuracy purposes.

Also, I've found Amazon to be a good place to get 4g esbit tabs, especially if you have Amazon Prime as mine have come with quick, free shipping.

[Roger Caffin]

> So I'll say let's time "First Boil" of bubbles breaking on the surface to "Full
> Boil". That should cover the situation.
Those bubbles have NOTHING to do with boiling. They are the dissolved gases (mainly oxygen I think) coming off. If I remember correctly, that starts around 80 C – a LONG way below boiling.

When Jetboil first came out they claimed some remarkable boil times. It turns out that they were probably starting with water about 30 C (OK, maybe 25 C), and only going to the start of the degassing bubbles around 80 C. There is a review here at BPL written when the first stoves apppeared and were tested by BPL. Shortly after our review the original boil-time claims were withdrawn.

Cheers

[Jerry Adams]

"200°F is plenty hot."

if you want to kill bugs, you can bring to 212 F and they're immediately dead

or, 195 F and let it sit for one minute

or, 180 F and let it sit for 5 minutes

I'm not sure of the exact numbers but it's something like that. I'd like to see a good source for better numbers.

The same principal for cooking meat. There was a "Science Friday" on NPR about that. You can get more moist chicken or turkey that way.

[Bob Moulder]

That's one good thing about slower boil times — more time at lower temperatures to kill the cooties.

So that creates another task… graph time vs temperature for a boil. :^)

[Eric Blumensaadt]

Bubbles in a "full boil" are what most people go by to purify water.

But I said that alternativey (and more scientifically) we could use a digital kitchen thermometer to measure the center pot temperature for what the boiling point AT THE TESTED ALTITUDE should be.

I'll bet if we GOOGLEd it we'd find that there are are charts available for boiling points at various altitudes.

[Bob Moulder]

I'll bet if we GOOGLEd it we'd find that there are are charts available for boiling points at various altitudes.

Yes, immediate results every time so I don't even bookmark it.

However, a fairly accurate and handy rule of thumb is 2°F drop per 1000 ft ASL.

[James Couch]

Jerry,

The Wilderness Medical Society has the following recommendations:

How Many Minutes To Boil Water Until Safe To Drink

30 minutes at 160° F

3 minutes at 185° F

Instant at 212° F

[Bob Moulder]

James, thanks! A simple guideline that's easy to remember.

I did an Esbit burn to get a bunch of data points for a graph (good motivation to learn to use Graph in Google Docs). I'll do the graph later. [now added]

Starting water temp of 48°F for 4 cups. Using 1.5 tabs with BGET, CC, Toaks 1350, ambient 57°F, no wind, 100ft ASL, digital kitchen thermometer with hole in pot lid for the probe. Time to reach 185°F was 12:30, reached 201°F ("light boil" with steady stream of bubbles) at 15:00, 206°F at 16:00 and 211°F at 17:00.

So 2.5 minutes between 185°F and 201°F here in the "lowlands". I put the water in the FD dinner bag and it sits quite a bit longer, which means the cooties are definitely cooked.

For this purpose, the slower burn of Esbit is a benefit.

[Dan Yeruski]

Hello Aaron, looks like your windscreen/pot support is made to burn the esbit in a slow mode correct? I say that because of the amount of incoming and exiting air holes.

Pot sits down into the pot support 1/4"…correct?

Is your windscreen/pot support closed during the burn mode?

What inspired you to use a bowl shaped pot?

As soon as my resupply of esbit arrives I will resume testing. I'm confident 2 four gram tablets will get the boil using a beer can pot with a straight wall windscreen.

[Eric Blumensaadt]

As soon as I get back to 'Vegas from "The People's Republic of California" I'm getting a good digital kitchen thermometer and begin doing a graph like Bob's. He inspired me to get off my ass and present my results.

More of us doing this in whatever stove we like will give us a body of results upon which to see what works best.

Being inordinately fond of my Trail Designs Sidewinder cone stove setup I'm thinking I'll get some decent results.

[Cayenne Redmonk]

For maximally comparable results, I would suggest measuring the change in temperature of 500mL of 4C water when exposed to 4g of esbit combustion.

500mL water, 4g esbit , 4C start are easy to measure and reproduce. Final temp is easy to measure.

2 cups is very hard to make reproducible without standardizing in a measuring cup, and how to use it.

[Dan Yeruski]

My last order was from ebay:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/290964424331

Arrival of my order is due next week Tuesday and then the fun will resume :-)

[Jameson Tisch]

Does using a beer can pot with esbit a challenge to deal with the leftover residue on the bottom or do you just not even deal with cleaning it off?

I know for my pots it's easy to just wipe it off and get it clean again but I figured it might be a little difficult with the beer can pot. Of course I'd assume one with a flat bottom would be easier than one with a rounded bottom.

[Dan Yeruski]

Jameson, I use a wet piece of toilet tissue to wipe the bottom of a beer can pot. Residue is water soluble.

Significant findings so far:

1. Richard May discovers small aluminum Red Bull type can bottom burns esbit completely. Tray is raised off ground.

2. BGET tray with bread pan corners best for retaining all molten esbit to achieve complete burn of tablet. Tray is raised off ground for complete combustion.

3. Aaron achieves boil of 2 cups with ½ of 14 gram tablet using bowl shaped pot on DIY pot support. BGET style tray is raised off ground for complete combustion.

If you have a significant fact found in this thread or elsewhere let us know and I'll add to this list.

[Jameson Tisch]

Thanks Dan.

Based on the findings so far I think an efficient and ultralight esbit setup would be one consisting of a titanium cone windscreen/pot support, a ridgeline flat bottom fosters pot, and a BGET esbit burner.

Similar to the esbit setup Trail Designs offers.

If you could get all that and have most of the pot inside the cone while burning (not half way out like the Trail Designs pot) and to be able to nest the cone inside the pot I think you'd have a real winner in my opinion. I haven't run the dimensions yet though but I'm not sure if that could all be physically possible due to the required height of the cone but it would be nice :)

[Eric Blumensaadt]

JT,

My Trail Designs Sidewinder for a 3 cup pot has the pot sitting ALL the way in except for the rim, which rests on the cone rim. And the Sidewinder series DOES have the cone(s) nesting inside the pot (rolled up in a Tyvek sleeve).

To my knowledge all Caldera Cones are this way for ESBIT and alcohol burners, whether they are ti cones or aluminum cones.

The only time my pot is halfway out of the cone is when it's resting on 2 parallel ti stakes in the Inferno wood burning mode.

[Jameson Tisch]

Eric,

I'm familiar with the type of setup you have and agree that it would be better for efficiency standards. The link below though is to the Trail Designs caldera cone for their fosters pot esbit system. The pot sits on the cone via a ridgeline placed halfway up the can. My guess is, that since half of the can is out of the cone and subsequently half of your water (if filled all the way), than you are losing some of the benefit of having a cone system like yours Eric where your entire pot sits within the cone.

http://www.traildesigns.com/stoves/caldera-keg-gvp

If using that cone, you could also purchase a fosters pot from Dan at the link below. Sits the ridgeline that sits on the top of the cone is placed up higher you are getting a much larger portion of the can inside the cone. But that is only possible due to a shorter fosters pot which then does not allow you to nest the cone inside. You could obviously still put the cone inside the pot but a good portion will stick out the top of the pot so you would most likely want something else such as a caddy to protect the cone.

http://www.woodgaz-stove.com/ridgeline-can-for-caldera-cone-keg.php

As I said, it is probably physically impossible based on the needed pot/cone dimensions. I'll have to check some numbers on various heights with a BGET stove…maybe if you use a legless one ?

Edit to add: Now that I think about it more, the only answer seems to be a stacking cone.

[Dan Yeruski]

The ridgelines on the Trail Designs and my beer can pots are at the 2 cup level. The water is below the support line, surrounded by heat of the cone and protected from the wind. Flat bottomed cans were made for DIY existing commercial pot supports and will not fit into a TD cone because the bottom diameter is too large to go down into the cone.

It's only a matter of time that TD will come out with a shorter Ti cone that fits into a beer can pot in the vertical position.

My recent tests show that an esbit tray needs to be positioned off center when using the Caldera Cone. It needs to be closer to the "closure" section. Incoming air pushes the flame off towards the opposite side and off the center of the pot. I use a tempered glass table with a mirror under it so I can see flame patterns when testing new stove designs. A year or two ago I showed a video using that set-up.

[Jameson Tisch]

Thanks for the clarification on that Dan. In that case, if you're boiling 2 cups of water or less the efficiency should be unaffected.

I saw a video you did below which you used a flat bottom pot. Are you not selling that anymore? Interesting way to use the 1 cup pot as a top.

Caldera Foster StarLyte: https://youtu.be/kbbp2LPVgck

Awesome stuff you're able to do with the glass table and mirror by the way. Really cool.

[Author]

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