A tricky stove choice

[Jacob Wallace]

I've done a bunch of research on stoves over the past couple of days, here and elsewhere, trying to find the right choice for an upcoming trip.

I'm heading to South America later this year for 4 months. We'll do some trekking / camping and some hostelling.

My current stove is a Kovea supalight ti, which I have had for around 6 years, but its time for a replacement I think. The output of the stove seems to slow to a trickle as the setup heats up, and the attachment to the canister needs to be tightened repeatedly…perhaps this is the o-ring needing replacement?

Regardless, the last big trip it was used on (the West Highland Way), a canister completely blew upon removing the burner, spewing unburnt fuel a couple of metres in the air…luckily it wasn't pointed at my face, and the stove was cool at the time…unsure if this was the fault of the canister or the stove. It was also day 2 of a 5 day trip, luckily this wasn't a remote location!

Anyway, for the replacement, I'm tossing up between alcohol and another gas stove. Pluses and minuses, as I see them:

Alcohol:
light weight (for shorter trips)
readily available fuel (a particular issue in Sth America)
cheap fuel
no / few moving parts to break
but…you can't simmer food easily (I wont be able to boil in the bag for 4 months!).

Gas:
difficult to get the canisters
expensive fuel
reliability?
great cooking control

Is there an ideal system / setup someone can recommend? Any thoughts welcome.

[Jace Mullen]

I know its not UL but it seems that this may be the perfect conditions for a whisperlite international.

The reason being that you are no longer relegated to either just white gas or just alcohol. You can pretty much use whatever is on hand.

But if weight is an issue on this trip, I would go alcohol.

[Seth Brewer]

I used a Packafeather XL stove with a Snowpeak Ti Mini Solo 0.8 L pot for about 4 weeks in the beginning of my A.T. thru hike

( before I went stoveless) and you can adjust the flame to simmer if you want to. Firefeather is the other model – each model with work with different size pots. It worked just fine for me and was extremely good on fuel (IMO).

HERE IS THE WEBSITE:http://packafeather.com/xlstove.html

I AM NOT ASSOCIATED WITH THIS COMPANY – JUST THE ONLY ADJUSTABLE ALKY STOVE I KNOW OF.

[Roger Caffin]

> a canister completely blew upon removing the burner,
One of two things.
Maybe a very poorly made Chinese clone of a canister – or rather clone of the valve. You didn't mention what brand canister.

Or maybe, you got dirt or water (ice) in the valve. If you don't carry the canister with the plastic cap over the Lindal valve, that can happen quite easily.

Cheers

[Jacob Wallace]

Hi Roger,

'twas a Coleman canister. I emailed Coleman afterward to report the incident, as it was my suspiscion the canister was faulty. They didn't bother to reply. Excellent customer service, I'm sure you'll agree.

Conditions weren't icy. I guess there's certainly a chance some dirt got in the end of the burner…but I think that's unlikely.

On the stoves, thanks for the Packafeather suggestion. Looks ideal, may try and pair that stove with what appears to be a superior windscreen / stand setup from Caldera.

However, has anyone and experience with flying with used alcohol stoves. We will need to take one or two flights. Of course you'd empty it out and not carry fuel…but do the residual smells cause issues with security?

[Steven McAllister]

There are alcohol stoves that simmer. Zelph has some kool ideas and I find his Super Stove very efficient. Add the simmer ring as needed.

I am partial to a good alcohol stove than others because of the reliability, simplicity, but most importantly the prevalence of fuel in remote locations.

I would never consider a canister stove for remote travels, a multi-fuel stove maybe, but they can be such a problem with flying.

I might mention that I cook rice, lentils and other foods on the Super Stove without the simmer ring by doing it in steps.

One example for rice and/or lentils, and such,
First step is to use just enough fuel to bring to a boil and then wrap the pot in a cozy, bandanna and/or clothing for 15 minutes. The amount of insulation is important in cold and/or windy situations.
Then with just a fraction of an ounce of fuel, bring it to a boil again, wrap and simmer for at least 30 more minutes.

[John Jensen]

My 2cents would be to take a sturdy Trangia, or learn to make a stove you can replace as you go …

http://hikinghq.net/sgt_stove/sgt_soda.html

Might be worth a test, anyway.

[Rob E]

Another vote for a Whisperlite international. The extra weight is worth being able to burn anything from kerosene, diesel or gasoline.

[John Jensen]

"kerosene, diesel or gasoline" but then you've got to worry about additives and fumes …

I actually bought a mutli-fuel stove (an Otpimus Nova when still "Made in Sweden"), but was scared off by the warnings in the instruction pack. You can burn aviation fuel or whatever, but stand back. My Nova is a solid stove for Prius car camping (low gear volume), but I just run it on Coleman fuel.

[Eric Blumensaadt]

If you decide on alcohol I recommend using the Caldera Cone with ONLY their stove as it has been optimized for that cone. Over a 7 day week you will actually save quite a bit more fuel weight than the aluminum cone.

This the most effieient alcohol stove setup I know of. There are many good reviews here on BPL on all the Caldera Cone models. I have the ti CC Sidewinder multi fuel model (alky, ESBIT or wood) and the alky setup is great.

P.S. I've used my ti Sidewinder outer cone with a MSR WindPro canister stove, only B/C the canister was safely remote, and saved fuel. But to use with canister or white gas (Remote only) fuel stoves you need a ti cone as the CC aluminum cones may melt. Call Trail Designs and ask them.

[Hikin’ Jim]

Jacob,

The first thing I would research is fuel availability. There is a really good list of International Fuel Names maintained by Doron Papo. That's the most up-to-date list I'm aware of.

If alcohol fuel is readily available, then that's a good way to go. Alcohol evaporates fairly cleanly and doesn't leave a lot of stink in fuel bottles or stoves. You can even use a "bottled water" type bottle to carry your fuel in and simply discard the bottle if the airlines give you any trouble. Likewise, with a DIY stove, you can simply discard the stove if the airlines give you any trouble. Simmering is a little bit more of a trick, but as mentioned PackaFeather stoves such as the FeatherFire do simmer. The Trangia burner also simmers and is well nigh indestructible. As I think about it, a Clikstand with a Trangia burner would be a really durable set up that might be a good one for international travel.

With gas, be careful of canister formats. Most locations will have threaded canisters available, but in some locations, only puncture type canisters will be available — if any canisters at all are available.

Gasoline and kerosene class fuels are probably the most widely available fuels internationally, but they take a heavier stove in order to burn them, and fuel bottles can be a bit of a trick to purge of all scents. Call your airline if you plan to take a liquid petroleum fueled stove. Yes, TSA regs matter, but so does the airline. Some airlines have rules that are far more restrictive than the TSA.

There are readily available stoves that will burn canister gas, gasoline class fuels, and kerosene class fuels, stoves such as the Whisperlite Universal and Primus Omnifuel. I've even heard of guys that have rigged them up to run on alcohol temporarily, but that's not recommended by the manufacturer, and you'd be on your own there.

Definitely don't take your current stove as is. Maybe all it needs is a good cleaning, but I wouldn't take it on any trip until the problems were fully resolved. Coleman usually has gotten back to me fairly reliably when I've emailed them, but some times it takes a few weeks. If you ever have a canister that jams open, and they occasionally do, put the stove back on. The valve on the stove will hold back the gas, and a lot of the time all you need to do to un-jam the valve is simply reseat and then remove the stove.

HJ
Adventures In Stoving

[Steven Paris]

The below text is from Danny Milks' account of gear used on their trip to South America last year:

Edit: removed link that didn't work.

"The MSR Superfly compressed gas stove was able to connect to threaded and unthreaded Lindal valves, which was a nice bit of insurance. Compressed gas canisters were sometimes difficult to find and ranged in price from $4 to $9 for a 220-gram can. This scarcity simply made us better planners and fuel misers. Chile had the best availability of canisters, thanks to the company Doite."

Thanks Jim! I couldn't get the link to work either.

[Hikin’ Jim]

I couldn't get that link to work, but here's the index to Danny and Kristin's various articles on BPL.

HJ
Adventures In Stoving

[Jacob Wallace]

Thanks all for the input, yes I have read Danny and Kirsten's articles, great stuff. Am actually using their gear lists as a bit of a prompt.

I'm not keen on mutlifuel stoves…don't like the weight or the petro fuels. Also, there's not too many places in the world where you can't get some strong alcohol. Indeed, perhaps more easily available than petrol products, given its in most corners stores in most towns? Hell, even a lot of petrol stations sell booze :).

On trangias, the first stoves I used were trangias (and knock-offs of trangias). They are incredibly heavy, so would rather go with one of the cottage lightweight options I think.

To Eric, have you actually used the packafeather with a caldera cone screen? I've seen on the TD website that they claim you shouldn't use other stoves with the setup but, well, I've a feeling that may be vested interest talking there!

[Hikin’ Jim]

Jacob,

In my testing of a FeatherFire with a Caldera Cone, I found that the two worked fairly well together.

The one thing that I'd change about the cone is to cut an inverted "V" in the bottom of the cone to run the simmer control cable through.

HJ
Adventures In Stoving

[Jacob Wallace]

Nice one Jim!

[C Nugget]

The more moving parts the more things will break. Packfeather stoves have moving parts. Mine broke on my first or second use.. something was wrong with the band. They fixed it and customer service was great… but I was sorta going for more reliable less breakable.

I thought I wanted a stove to simmer but once I got onto boiling water and an insulating cozy for my pot, I found I didn't really need simmer so much. That may not always be the case depending where you travel and what kind of foods you can buy.

The thermojet stove is pretty well rated stove if you want to buy an alcohol system. I've had mine for 3 years now. I would recommend getting the large size over the regular and pairing it with a wider pot w/lid for even better heat times. It has a "simmer" band which makes a boil last longer but it's not really adjustable once you push it down.

Don't forget about the cat food can stove.. Just made one for the first time and wish I had known before spending $$ on alcohol stoves how to make one:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pajkt594Ruw
Easy to make, not expensive, hard to break beyond repair and easy to replace. Don't even need to pack one on the plane.. Just need a water bottle to carry fuel, some tin foil for a wind screen, hole punch & fuel. :P

If you want a stove that simmers… what about a penny stove?
Only read about them:
http://www.jureystudio.com/pennystove/stoveinstruct.html

One could bring a stove to simmer that's not alcohol and make an alcohol stove as a backup?

[Author]

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