trouble with caldera cone

Sorry to hear about your Caldera packing it in. They are awesome, I have one too, although I ordered the Caldera kitchen and it comes with the storage cup and a few other goodies so hopefully I won't have the same troubles you did. To answer your question though, I do believe that Trail Designs has made a two part Caldera, although I can't seem to find reference to it on their website right now. You could probably phone them and ask about, I hear they have awesome customer service. I seem to also remember that these new two part Calderas were much harder to manufacture and maybe only available for a few different pots, they were also considerably more expensive if I remember correctly, likely due to the difficulty of making them, I'm sure someone else will chime in shortly and tell you what the name of the model is and some more specifics on pricing and availability.

Hi…..sorry you had troubles with your dovetail joint. Yea…that's one of the reasons we introduced the Caddy, and started shipping them with every cone. Send me an email (found on the TD website) and we can work something out to get you going again.

As to the 2-part cone…..we call the "Fissure"……it is definitely something we have been investigating recently. The issue was stated correctly, they are very tough to make by hand…..so we are talking with a shop nearby that has a water-jet machine that spits out gritty water at Mach-2… literally….. Mach-2…. and it appears to be able to cut through a stack of sheet metal like butter. If we can get all the cad worked out, and the clamping fixtures figured out, and get the price/unit down, we just might be able to get this design out there in the not too distant future. (As you might have read, we've been cranking up the Caldera Keg line with the new Heineken version and the exclusive we will be announcing at the KO….so haven't been focused on the Fissure)

For background on the Fissure…..don't forget, that with the smaller top cone, you are limited to taller pots with handles biased toward the top so they don't cut through the top cone when you make the handle relief. There is a wiki page up on it…..and a thread…and a review. Here are the links.

….and please….do send me an email…..

Rand :-)

http://wiki.backpackinglight.com/Caldera_Fissure

http://www.backpackinglight.com/cgi-bin/backpackinglight/reviews/display_reviews?forum_thread_id=14890&cat=Stoves%20-%20Other&cid=21

http://www.backpackinglight.com/cgi-bin/backpackinglight/forums/thread_display.html?forum_thread_id=14264

Joshua,

The dovetail joint can be an achilles heel. Also, one could real slice a finger if not careful (I haven't yet).

If you get one with a keg, and slide the cone inside it "top" down, the joint will be complete in the keg. Plus there is only about 5/8" of the cone protuding above the lip of the Keg, and it is the bottom without the joint. I can put a small fuel bottle, Ti Spork, stove, and foil lid into the cone and store it in a cuben sack. No caddy needed and total weight w/o fuel is 3.9 oz.

My Snow Peak Solo Mug set-up is different. The Cone sticks above the mug by 50% and I need to cover the set up with 1/2 of a caddy. Total weight w/o fuel is 8.2 oz. But I like cooking (boiling) with the mug much better, and the caddy can be used as a cup/bowl.

I take the keg set-up when I need to cover a lot of elevation gain, and every ounce counts. On flatter trips, I take the Snow Peak set-up.

Thanks again for the quick responses. Hope to get one of those two part systems in the future. Great product overall.

Good company. Makes a good product. This one should last a long time with the new caddy they sent me. The caddy can be used as two cups also. Thanks again Rand and George.

looking at this thread i wondered what I would do if the cone broke on me. This is a, maybe very obvious, quick fix.
Franco

All:

Relative to "field repair" of the dovetail. One thing we have been recommending lately is to keep the dovetail clean and try a little oil if it starts getting rough. That seems to help avoid the situations where you would be inclined to force it together. Second, if you truly have a failure, and can't do anything else, you can, as a last resort, "snap" the larger dovetail onto the smaller one. I strongly recommend against this as a normal practice because it fatigues/weakens the dovetail and will ultimately cause it to fail. But if you are out of options in the field, you might want to keep that in mind.

Rand :-)

Franco, That is exactly what I did.