Caldera Cone Awesomeness

Sounds great. All we're missing here is a picture.

Yes, picture please…

Have to wait until the movie ends, or I'll catch even more flack for not watching than I already am. Should be up in the next 2 hours. I agree pics are helpful, and I'll try to include the extras thrown in by Rand at TD.com. [Stay Tuned for Edit to Post]

Edited first post on accident. Have more if there's interest. Sorry for the sideways bits, they are all straight up on my computer and phone so … who knows?

Very nice

I thought you had to be at least a former customer for them to send just a cone out, as they want to sell a kit that would include their 12-10 stove, at least what Rand told me in a email reply when I asked a year ago to get a cone for my .6 Evernew pot I got from one of the small suppliers. I have three CC setups, one came with a .55? mug I got from one of our members here.
Duane

What does the cone weigh?

I can't get a boil in 8 minutes. Probably cause I'm at altitude but I don't understand how people are getting rolling boils in 8 minutes with 1/2 ounce of gas. 1/2 of gas for me goes out in roughly 12 minutes and I still don't have a rolling boil.

Me neither – usually about 25ml does it for me.

I'm not so keen on the tri-ti….I've only got three of them ;-)

Jon, I've used my 12-10 stove and I believe it was the same boil time roughly at home (3800') as at elevation, a little over 7 minutes, for 12oz Sierra temp water. The short Evernew .6L pot seemed even faster, which sets in the same distance to stove as my larger .9L pot. You'd think it would need to be shorter to get the pot closer to the flame. Hmm?
Duane
PS: fuel was around 1/2 oz. and recovered some.
PPS: more fuel at the start, seemed to be more efficient, but that has been covered some in other threads.

@Duane – that may be the case; I am a former customer. But it doesn't hurt to ask. Tell them you e pieced your kit together and only need a cone if that's the case. I bet you could work something out.

My other cones 850 Tri-Ti, and a SP 700 fusion cone probably take a but longer. I've had good times to report but he averages and ease were not as consistent. The 550 is a smaller pot, thinner walled, and closer to the stove. Not sure why but two for two last night on under/@ 8 minute boils. There were enough bubble in 7 to call it a boil for FBC purposes. I'll try a 12-10 this weekend and see how they compare.

Edit to add: Ed, not sure what it took because I had plenty left over – no sign of yellow or sputtering flames. I have done 15 ml boils before and suspect I could here. After the second run, the stove was still quite full – almost set to the touch. Part of my current experiment is how long remains stay in the StarLyte and how well they travel. I have a small ziplock bag around it to see.

Maybe I have a defective Starlyte…..

I have a Toaks 900 and Caldera Cone. I fill it with 1/2 ounce of gas. It goes out in about 12 minutes and the pot has bubbles formed on the bottom, but nothing I would consider boiling.

What are you doing about the distance between the pot and the stove? With the 12-10 I found I needed the stakes in the lower holes of the cone to lift up the pot a bit. With the starlyte I just set it all the way inside and voila! Major bubbles with 1/2 ounce in 6-8 mins (depending on temps)

I let it the lip of the pot rest on the top of the cone, it's as close to the stove as Trail Designs intended, I assume.

If you have the sidewinder you use the stakes to hold the pot up using the 12-10 stove , if it is a regular ti tri the lip of the pot should sit on the cone..

What about using the full size caldera cone with the starlyte stove? Does this work?

Edit: Well the person who started this thread used the starlyte stove with the full-size cone duh, sorry.

"Probably cause I'm at altitude but I don't understand how people are getting rolling boils in 8 minutes with 1/2 ounce of gas. 1/2 of gas for me goes out in roughly 12 minutes and I still don't have a rolling boil."

Setting aside water temp, if you are using a modified Startlyte, the top of the stove should be ~1.5" below the bottom of your pot according to Dan Y. If it is more than that, you may have to put some shim under your stove or, if it's less than 1.5", scoop out a little soil.

I don't know about the Starlite stove, having never seen one. But I'm wondering if there's something about a Caldera Cone that changes the stove-to-pot distance for optimal efficiency. I sent Rand an e-mail asking this question, but he didn't respond.

You see, I make pot supports for you folks, and some people have asked for a pot stand that would work in a Caldera Cone. I usually recommend a distance of 1.0"-1.25" (1.5" max) for alcohol stoves, and 1.25"-1.5" for Esbit. But maybe there's something about the cone that might change the optimal distance. Anybody have some ideas about this?

"You see, I make pot supports for you folks, and some people have asked for a pot stand that would work in a Caldera Cone. I usually recommend a distance of 1.0"-1.25" (1.5" max) for alcohol stoves, and 1.25"-1.5" for Esbit. But maybe there's something about the cone that might change the optimal distance. Anybody have some ideas about this?"

Hopefully Dan Y will post up on this one. My hunch is that it has to do with making adequate O2 available for the amount of alcohol being delivered for oxidation by a given stove design. I also have his Simmerlite, and he told me the optimal distance is 1" for this much smaller aperture, low intensity stove.

A suggestion on pot supports: make an adjustable version that would enable people to experiment and also work for all, or nearly all, stoves.

The way I understand it is the each cone is designed to work with a particular pot and the 12-10 burner.
If you change either the pot or the burner you will likely get a different result.
With my full size cone, 550ml pot and 12-10 stove I get 500ml to boil in about 7:30 at around 60f using 95% Ethanol.
You should get similar results with SLX.

That's a good thought, Tom. Maybe low air inflow means we need a lower distance between stove and pot?

As for the adjustable pot supports, maybe people should just order a tall one, and then shove it into the ground when they need a shorter one–that's fairly adjustable, right? I can't think of a way to actually make them truly adjustable, really, as they seem to work best if they're custom made for a given stove/fuel/pot situation. But I'm certainly open to suggestions. Maybe use 3 Vargo titanium stakes in a triangle? That would be quite adjustable as far as height.

Yes – thanks for that Tom.

I took an open tealight (try flying with a used stove in Europe) to Mallorca over Xmas and it was really inefficient, till I put it on a stone and it was closer to the pot.

It may have been in part down to using Spanish laundry cleaning fluid as fuel!

A friend made me a tealight 'Starlyte' complete with carbon felt – looks very sweet and weighs 5g – yet to use it….

The pot support on a "standard" Starlyte is 1" if that helps. Agreed that the cone may cause some need for tweaking.

Thanks, Dale, that helps.