Recommend me a disposal cylinder stove

[Overshot]

I have always been an achy and esbit user, and a whisperlite in winters. There are several compressed CNG / LP stoves out there. What is highly recommended? This will be mostly 3 season use, with some 4 season with proper warming of cylinders. Thanks!

[USA Duane Hall]

I have a number of isobutane stoves. Have not used my Snow Peak GS-100 much, it runs well. I used my MSR Micro Rocket on my vacation last July. Really happy with it, boils 1.5 cups of Sierra water about 3 minutes give or take a little. Cannot recall now, pretty quick, faster than my classic MSR G, GK etc. I use my newer and old white gas stoves for winter time as they are more stable and fuel is cheaper. I have some remote canister stoves, but to me, it is more fun using the old classics.
Duane

[Jonathan Hanson]

It's hard to go wrong with Snow Peak, either the Gigapower or Litemax, for an ultralightweight stove. MSR's remote-canister Windpro II allows feed from either an upright canister (for flame control and simmering) or an inverted canister for maximum low-temperature efficiency. And for $25 it's hard to beat the Primus Classic Trail. It's not very compact, but simmers beautifully.

[Hikin’ Jim]

If you're thinking about some four season use, then I think a remote canister stove is the way to go. You're in Maine frequently? Definitely go with a remote canister stove.

The WindPro (MSRP $100) is a good stove but not particularly compact. My preference is the Kovea Spider (MSRP $65) which is quite a bit less expensive.

HJ
Adventures In Stoving
Hikin' Jim's Blog

[Hikin’ Jim]

If however you did want an upright canister stove for warmer weather, my recommendations would be as follows:
$40 range — Snow Peak GS-100, 3 oz weight.
$50 range — Kovea Supalite, 2 oz weight. My review of the Kovea Supalite.
$60 range — Snow Peak LiteMax, 1.9 oz. Really the same stove as the Supalite (it's made by Kovea and then stamped "Snow Peak"), but slightly lighter.
$75 range — Soto Windmaster. 2.3 oz weight. Really nice stove with better performance in wind. Good ignition system. Excellent build quality. Soto is making the nicest canister stoves on the market. A bit pricey, but it the absolute lightest with a piezo ignition available.

Of course you could just carry a remote canister stove all year. A bit of a weight penalty. The Kovea Spider is 5.9 oz for example. But it can use a full 360 degree windscreen and you'd only have to buy one stove for year around use.

HJ
Adventures In Stoving
Hikin' Jim's Blog

[Phillip Asby]

I like stoves and have too many (not as many as Jim but…!)

Still if I had to pick a setup I'd get a litemax for weight and weather and a kovea spider for group or winter trips and be fully prepared.

[Bob Gross]

"a moves spider"

What the heck is that?

–B.G.–

[James Couch]

+1 for the Soto stoves. I have the predecessor to the Windmaster, totally reliable – including the piezo starter. I also have the small add on windscreen Soto made for it, works great!

[Jerry Adams]

I have Soto Windmaster. Very well made. Piezo works. I even like the regulator valve even though it doesn't make the stove usable at a lower temperature. You still need a windscreen – the "windmaster" function adds only a little utility.

[Billy Ray]

+2 for Soto…. when considering the piezo eliminates the need for a lighter, its in there with the lightest canister stoves but better quality
billy

[Hikin’ Jim]

I haven't seen anything nicer than the Soto stoves on the American market. The workmanship is really good. Everything is very precise. The tolerances are tight. And the piezo system they've got is miles ahead of anything anyone else has got. The Windmaster is the lightest stove with piezo available.

They may have done a bit of a disservice to themselves (at least among the informed) with all the hype about improved cold weather performance on their Microregulator stove — cold weather performance increases that are so minor as to be imperceptible to anyone actually cooking in the field.

There's been a lot of hype about how the new Jetboil Mini-Mo and MSR Windboiler have regulator valves and still have good flame control (earlier regulator valved stoves from those companies did not). Well, Soto had excellent valve control from the very beginning, something that the other companies took a couple of years to catch up on — and the Soto is still better than some of the current offerings in terms of flame control.

Soto is clearly the high end canister stove, but you do pay for it.

HJ
Adventures In Stoving
Hikin' Jim's Blog

[Jerry Adams]

what's good about Soto regulator, is that after the stove runs for one minute, the canister cools from evaporative cooling. With needle valve, the flame goes way down and you have to turn it up. With regulator, it maintains the flame level.

Not a big deal to have to turn up needle valve after a minute, but it's sort of like "putting a frog in a pot of water and bringing to boil" – you don't notice it until a minute later when it all of a sudden you notice the flame is way down and you're barely heating the water. More of an agravation than anything important.

[Hikin’ Jim]

Yeah, a regulator valve has been called the "cruise control" of stoves. That and in hot temperatures (and therefore high canister pressure) they can make a stove safer by keeping the flow of gas under control. It's the basically imaginary cold weather performance gains that gripe me.

HJ
Adventures In Stoving
Hikin' Jim's Blog

[Overshot]

Thanks all. Soto it is. In speaking of 4 season, I was thinking of being out in an occasional snow shower. In anything more than that I will be taking my whisperlight. Thanks for your comments.

[Jerry Adams]

Soto should be good down to about 25 F. Sort of slow at that temp. Make sure you have canisters that are isobutane, not n-butane (or just butane), but most canisters are that.

[Matthew Black]

I have Snow Peak GST-100 and GST-120 stoves (titanium Giga Power and LiteMax) and the Soto OD-1R. I think that the Giga Power is the best build quality and most rugged design but haven't used it in the field. The Soto is a close second in build quality and design and although I find the pot supports fiddly and potentially flimsy, I appreciate the reliable igniter, broad burner head and consistent output until the canister is empty. For the extra half ounce it has become my go to stove, replacing the LiteMax. I even keep it in it's ridiculously overbuilt nylon carry sack since it makes Ken Thompson laugh.

I think the LiteMax is also well made, but as many have mentioned on the forums, the aluminum threads concern me and require more care than the brass found in both the Giga Power and Soto stoves.

[Russ W]

Here's a quick question to tag onto this discussion. I have a weekend trip planned and anticipate 20 degree temps. In warmer weather I've been using alcohol, and for really cold weather, white gas.I wanted to use a gas canister stove for this solo trip and I have 2: Snow Peak Giga GS 100, and a Kovea Spider. I planned to use the SP for solo trips and the Kovea for 2 or more.

Will the Snow Peak perform at 20 degrees, should I use the Kovea, or should I plan on white gas.

Thanks for the help.

Edit – See where Jerry says 25 degrees is sluggish with the SP. Maybe take that out of consideration…. Kovea or white gas?

[Jerry Adams]

at 20 F you can either use inverted stove, or heat up the upright canister

the one thing I don't like about inverted, is it's possible for stuff to come out canister and clog stove. Less likely if better quality canister. This is second hand… Roger's stoves are probably the best if you can find one. Don't add much weight. Other inverted stoves are a bit heavier.

I think easiest way to heat up canister is to have shallow pan of water. If it starts freezing, then add a little of the water you've heated. The heat of combustion is 100x the heat to vaporize, so you only have to use 1% of your heated water.

Someone turned canister upside down, put water in, put a lid that fit over bottom of canister, and turned back upright. I can't find a lid that exactly fits.

[Phillip Asby]

a "moves" spider is me typing too quickly on a tablet! Doh!

[Robert Blean]

Jerry Adams said
"the one thing I don't like about inverted, is it's possible for stuff to come out canister and clog stove"

I have noticed that some inverted rigs have the canister valve at the lowest point when inverted, while others have the canister canted — making the low point be in a shoulder of the canister, not near the valve.

It seems to me that the latter design is much to be preferred as any gunk should settle to that shoulder area — away from the valve and away from a trip to your stove burner.

–MV

[Jerry Adams]

interesting thought

you couldn't use the last little bit of butane in the canister. you could always use that upright though

if the contaminant was dissolved in the butane, this technique wouldn't help

[Gary Dunckel]

Robert, I'm thinking like you. When I first saw Jetboil's Joule stove, I thought they might be courting disaster with the vertical canister. So I geeked out and cut the bottom off an empty canister. I wanted to see just what the inside looked like, and to see if I could find any gunk stuck to the walls. These two photos show that there is a 5 mm plastic extension tube from the Lindal housing. The opening of the gas line is therefore slightly above the bottom of a vertically inverted canister.

And:

So while the gunk (waxes, etc.) settle to the lowest point in the canister, they might drop past that raised opening. Or they might just follow the flow of the liquid into the gas line, who knows? It just seems to me that a canted canister would offer a slightly smaller target for the gunk particles. But maybe it doesn't make any difference whether the canister is canted or not, and that gunk WILL find its way into the gas line.

Also, I should note that I could detect no bits of gunk inside the canister. It happened to be a 2006 version of a Snow Peak canister, from when they made them in Japan (better refining technique, so less/no gunk?).

Edit: Jerry, no matter how you invert the canister, you can't get all the fuel out, due to that 5 mm plastic housing tube. So yeah, one needs to do a couple of cups of coffee with the stove in the upright mode to empty the canister.

[Hikin’ Jim]

Soto should be good down to about 25 F. Sort of slow at that temp. Make sure you have canisters that are isobutane, not n-butane (or just butane), but most canisters are that.

I think that's sound. I'd have probably said 20F instead of 25, but whatever.

The trick is to not let the canister get colder than the surrounding air when you're in temperatures like those. Recall that the canister is cooling from within as part of the process of turning the fuel inside from liquid to gas. Keeping the canister in a bowl of tepid water works pretty well for maintaining the canister temperature.

HJ
Adventures In Stoving
Hikin' Jim's Blog

[Roger Caffin]

> So while the gunk (waxes, etc.) settle to the lowest point in the canister,
Dirt may settle to the lowest point, although the stuff I have seen was awfully fine. The waxes are dissolved and will go with the rest of the liquid flow. This is all different from the upright state, where the waxes and dust don't evaporate like propane and butane.

> 2006 version of a Snow Peak canister, from when they made them in Japan (better
> refining technique, so less/no gunk?).
Yes.

> no matter how you invert the canister, you can't get all the fuel out, due to that
> 5 mm plastic housing tube. So yeah, one needs to do a couple of cups of coffee with
> the stove in the upright mode
Not correct. IF you have the canister slightly warm, the last few millimetres of fuel will vaporise inside the inverted canister and come out as gas. Been there many times. The canister can chill down fairly fast when this happens.

Cheers

[Gary Dunckel]

I see, Roger, so we're stuck with wax-gunk no matter what. Shouldn't dirt be rare or non-existant with quality canisters? And to get the last bit of fuel out of it, we need to set the inverted canister as close to the stove as is safe to warm up and vaporize the fuel? This is good information. Now I need to learn how to clean the wax from the clogged jet in the dark with gloves on. It sounds like most inverted canister stoves will eventually get clogged with waxes.

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