Checking out Four Dog’s Bushcooker LT Mini

[Owen McMurrey]

My first look at the Four Dog Stove Bushcooker LT Mini:
http://fourdog.com/bushcookerlt-mini-camp-stove/

Four Dog claims a total weight of 72g/2.5oz, and that 3/4oz of alcohol will boil 16oz of water in 7 minutes.

Weights are as observed on my scale.
Complete system: 74g/2.6oz
Stove: 20g/.7oz
Pot supports: 11g/.39oz
Windscreen: 43g/1.5oz

btw, the windscreen is discolored from trying it with a Whitebox Solo.

18g/.63oz of fuel brought 24oz of tap water to a boil in 7 min 35 sec, and the stove burned out 35 seconds later. The pot was a Snow Peak Trek 700 with Four Dog's titanium lid.

My interest in this stove system was mainly its compact packed size. I wanted everything to fit inside my mug.
I've ruined several of the cheap foil windscreens getting them too close to my Whitebox Solo and Solo II stoves using the Snow Peak mug.
Had the Four Dog stove not worked so well, I would have been using the windscreen with a Whitebox. However, it boiled faster, with less fuel, and without a primer pan or wait for ignition inherent to a pressurized stove, so I'm very happy with the Four Dog one.
Combined with the windscreen's minimal use of space, the stove's size also allows more room for storing fuel inside the mug. Pictured here with 1x2oz and 2x1oz containers:

This is very convenient for me, because I do 1-2 night trips almost weekly.
The pot supports are much longer than necessary(supposed to double as spare tent pegs), and I plan to cut them down so they will also fit inside the mug.

My initial impression is that I like this setup very much, and a search didn't turn up a review or discussion of the Mini here, so thought I'd throw this out there.

[DGoggins]

Thanks for bringing this product to my attention….I wasn't aware of it. $32 seems pretty reasonable too, and the weight looks great. Sure, its probably not as efficient as a caldera cone, but you do get the ability to use a wide range of pots.

[Owen McMurrey]

I was particularly happy with the fact it boiled 24oz of water with less fuel than they claim for 16oz.
'Course I've only tried it in my kitchen, but it made a very good impression.
Also going to try it with Hexamine tabs, and even less fuel. I don't really need my water to come to a boil, especially when it's just being used for coffee.

[Delmar O’Donnell]

Hi Owen. Put your new stove (& screen & pot) to the test…grab either Ben's or Glenn's Stove Efficiency Spreadsheet and run a couple of tests and take the average. Post your results in the ASEPT thread.

Above, you said 2 cups of water on 22 ml of fuel. Getting 470 ml to boil on 22 ml of alcohol doesn't sound all that efficient, but it's impossible to know without a couple of missing parameters, such as initial water temp, your elevation, fuel used. Maybe the efficiency is great?

I would guess you should be able to make at least 60% efficiency with this or a similar setup, which would be decent. I think this because I have a similar short, straight (not cone) windscreen-with-ti-stakes setup, and I'm getting test results showing efficiencies around 65%, respectable for straight cylinder windscreens.

The other comment I'd make is, test your setup for wind resistance. I'm seeing some large-ish windscreen holes that look like they line up vertically with holes on the stove (can't tell due to perspective), and a fairly wide gap between windscreen and pot; these are variables that can lead to wind vulnerability.

[Delmar O’Donnell]

Hi again Owen. I took a blind flying leap at calculating efficiency, based on your report above. Assumed 70F water, that you were at 1000 feet elevation, that your actual boil temp was 210, and that you were using SLX or other off-the-shelf denatured as fuel. If these parameters were true, you'd be getting 53% efficiency on your stove, based on the Ben's Improved worksheet.

[Owen McMurrey]

Yeah. Try 710mL of water, and 18.6mL of alcohol.

[Owen McMurrey]

"Above, you said 2 cups of water on 22 ml of fuel."
Nowhere did I say anything about using either 2 cups of water, or 22mL of fuel.

[Owen McMurrey]

Moving on…
Today I tried the stove setup with two Coghlan's "Fuel Tablets"/Hexamine(with the exhaust fan running).

Four Dog claims "14 grams esbitt/heximine will boil 16 oz in 7 minutes–conserving fuel and saving you time."
Again, I'm using 24oz of water, instead of 16, which began to boil at ~8min 6sec…

…and would have doubtless boiled an even larger amount, given that the two fuel tablets continued to burn for several minutes afterwards.

I like the simplicity of the Hexamine, but it does leave a residue on the pot. The fuel tabs not having nearly as much odor as the Esbitt tabs I've used in the past was a pleasant surprise, though.

More than satisfied with the performance with both denatured alcohol and Hexamine tabs.

[Delmar O’Donnell]

>> "Above, you said 2 cups of water on 22 ml of fuel."
> Nowhere did I say anything about using either 2 cups of water, or 22mL of fuel.

Really? That's odd, that's what I read the first time through your post. I noticed you'd edited your initial post, and I did notice different numbers the second time I looked. I assumed you had revised. If those much better numbers are the correct numbers, run them through a spreadsheet and see what you get.

I notice you say you are boiling 710 ml of water in a SP Trek 700. You gotta teach me how to do that! I would have water all over the place if I tried that.

Sounds like you're satisfied, and that's all that counts.

[Owen McMurrey]

There were no changes to any of the numbers in my original post.
The Trek 700 holds 28.25oz/835mL when full.

[Delmar O’Donnell]

> The Trek 700 holds 28.25oz/835mL when full.

Interesting. Trek's website must be in error, then–they say 24 oz capacity.

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