has anyone tested the new Primus winter gas?

[Bob Gross]

"the psper barrier"

I can't find psper on the Periodic Table of the Elements.

–B.G.–

[jimmer ultralight]

Just to give purpose to your life,Bob.:)

I went back and corrected it.

You won't find "paper" in tbe table of elements ,either. Sorry.

[Bob Moulder]

…advantage to the paper barrier if it acted as a filter and prevented any junk floating around in tbe cannister from getting in the valve during inverted use?

Looking at the image from the earlier link it appears the paper "vapour mesh" doesn't even do that.

Fire that puppy up at -10F with a 1/3 full, cold canister (upright) and it'll make a believer out of me. Although I'm a relatively recent gas convert, I've now messed with enough of these canisters in cold enough conditions to know that isn't going to happen absent the application of external heat to at least kick-start vaporization, and then more external heat to keep it going.

It has been out long enough that if it had any merit there would be some "holy cow!" reviews coming from somewhere other than the marketing department. I google this every now and then, and I still haven't seen any scientific or field reports.

If anyone has seen some report by someone who has actually used one in the cold, I'd like to see it.

[jimmer ultralight]

Hope springs eternal and I was hoping there was SOME valid purpose for that paper barrier.
besides marketing BS. Looks like there isn't…Bummer.

[Stuart R]

According to the marketing spin:
After 60 minutes of cooking, a Winter Gas cartridge is approximately 9% more powerful than one without Vapour Mesh, after 120 minutes of use it delivers about 15 % more power.

I don't know what temperature this was measured at, but they are claiming a pretty small difference (for an expensive canister). A regular canister inverted will give MUCH better performance.

[Roger Caffin]

> After 60 minutes of cooking, a Winter Gas cartridge is approximately 9% more powerful
> than one without Vapour Mesh, after 120 minutes of use it delivers about 15 % more
> power.

Just to add what Stuart wrote – those claims are actually rather funny. Who ever runs a stove for 60 minutes – let alone 120 minutes ??? I mean, cooking for two whole hours straight ??? Um – would a canister even last that long ?

And no, trying to explain that this was all done with little 5 minute bursts does not justify the original claim. Conditions would be changing so much that it would be meaningless.

Spin … sigh. Just BS.

Cheers

[Roger Caffin]

> EPI Gas in Japan has promoted a paper lined "power gas" canister rated to -15c for
> some years now.

AHA! Light dawns. I can see it all.

Just maybe someone in Primus Marketing saw this and thought 'what a clever idea', and promptly contracted with EpiGas for a big load of them with Primus markings. So maybe they (marketing) never did any research at all into whether the concept works. But now they have a container load of these they have to get rid of somehow. "Ah well, let's plow some $$ into a big marketing push and rely on our [fast fading] reputation."

Yeah, it figures.

Cheers

[Jerry Adams]

1 pint of water takes 3 minutes to boil on high. 1/4 ounce of fuel. so 8 ounce canister goes 96 minutes on high. So 60 minutes is about 2/3 used. approximately.

[Bob Gross]

"whether the concept works"

Please define.

If the actual fuel works good at cold temperatures would be one concept. If the stuff sells in the store would be another concept.

What is the purpose of marketing? Some will argue that marketing is the act of educating the consumer into buying something that he thinks he needs or wants, regardless of whether he really needs or wants it, regardless of whether it is any good, and regardless of the competition.

–B.G.–

[Bob Moulder]

Winter Gas won the best overall product at this week’s Outdoor Trade Show Novel Awards, which are judged by experts in the outdoor field.

And who are we paeans to question this??!!! lol

Edited to highlight "EXPERTS"

[Roger Caffin]

I think you meant 'peons'. A paean is a song of praise. :-)

Expert: ex: a has been; spurt: a drip under pressure.
So much for the Outdoor Trade Show. (Makes turkey noises off stage.)

Cheers

[Bob Moulder]

There I go, lazy and relying on spell checker.

I will never trust experts again!

[Woubeir (from Europe)]

A crude test on Hiking in Finland where a new canister of Wintergas was about 30 seconds faster then the 'new' Powergas in bringing 500 ml to a rolling boil, made me thinking about this vapor mesh actually being able to do something.
So I'm still not convinced that this mesh would actually help, but I want to keep an open mind.
So makes the following hypothesis any sense: one of the factors for creating vapour pressure in a closed container is the largeness of the contact area between fuel as a liquid and fuel as vapor, wright ? So if this mesh can wick fuel (in the liquid state) increasing this contact area, couldn't this absorbed fuel vaporise and actually increase the vapor pressure ?

Just an hypothesis I want to check here, nothing more.

[Jerry Adams]

That makes sense it would be faster, as you hypothesized

The question though, is will it work at a colder temperature, but that's pretty unrelated. If it evaporates faster, it will get more evaporative cooling so after a while it will slow down.

But, good opportunity for an experiment. Try equally full conventional and winter gas canisters at different temperatures. See if there's a temperature, like 20 or 25 F where one doesn't work but the other does.

[Woubeir (from Europe)]

I think I found where this hypothesis already can stop: vapor pressure is independent of the surface area.

[Larry De La Briandais]

It could cause the liquid to evaporate faster, but will not increase the pressure.

[Ken Larson]

Sir…..Can you tell me when and where I may purchase Primus Winter Gas that contains the 'VaporMesh'?

REPLY:

We have an approximate release date of winter 2015.
Joe

Brunton Product Support
7088 Winchester Circle
Boulder, CO 80301 USA

http://www.bruntongroup.com

[Roger Caffin]

Hi Woubeir

> one of the factors for creating vapour pressure in a closed container is the
> largeness of the contact area between fuel as a liquid and fuel as vapor?
True, it would be one of the factors for high speed vaporisation.
But in a slow flow situation as found with a canister stove, my gut feeling is that the effect would be less than 1% of the overall limits.

The real limits to vaporisation in the cold are heat input, heat input and heat input.

Vague suspicion, based on other situations.
First, I don't believe Primus or Epigas have a clue what they are talking about. Or maybe they do, but are desperate to sell their warehousse full of paper canisters. That would make commercial sense.

Second, the whole idea may have been sparked by something people do (sometimes) with those large/tall bottle of propane gas used on houses. In the winter they use several tall ones (like, maybe 4' high) all hooked together and they sit them in the sun. The idea, which does work to a limited degree, is that the bigger surface area in the sun helps pick up more sun power, helping the propane to evaporate.

Something you can try yourself to test some of this. Stick a canister in a deep freeze for a few hours (in some parts of America right now, that may mean just leaving it outside for a bit!). Take a shallow bowl of water at, say, +10 C. Put the steel canister in the bowl of water while listening carefully. You will hear an almost instant boiling sound as the gas inside absorbs heat/energy through the steel shell from the water. You don't need blotting paper for this!

Cheers

[Bob Moulder]

I can't wait to burn the 'summer' gas in my Jetboil MiniMo next winter!

Wish I could obtain some 100% n-butane for testing purposes.

I'm almost 100% certain that I could burn 100% isobutane in the winter with no problems with the HX strip. I've pretty much done that with a nearly empty 230g canister (17g remaining) at +7F.

Edit to add last paragraph.

[James Marco]

Larry, Yes….but, I believe you are assuming a static condition. When you are actively drawing off fuel, it will also cool the canister. The temperature is not static assuming faster evaporation. It doesn't really make sense. The heat HAS to come from somewhere.

At border line temps this could help a little with the amount of gas available to be burned initially. But, like Roger says, temperature is more important at the near lower limit. As the gas vaporizes, it will draw heat off. Without a heat shunt, or wire or some conductive material between the gas canister and the stove flame, the canister will cool faster, too. This will further reduce the vaporization and the pressure. This is a dead end, except for the initial minute or so. (Or, until it reaches a new stability at the rate you are drawing off fuel.)

Of course this would have no effect on an inverted canister.

[Bob Gross]

"We have an approximate release date of winter 2015."

That would be now.

–B.G.–

[Woubeir (from Europe)]

saw this. Didn't watch the video yet, but has anyone already an idea why this difference although Powergas and Wintergas use the same blend ?

[Stuart R]

Shops around here have started to stock the new Power Gas, but not Winter Gas canisters. Power Gas is now a blend of iso-butane and propane, like JetBoil, whereas GoGas is regular n-butane and propane, a difference the folks at Outdoors Magic don't seem to have twigged.
I would expect Power Gas and JetBoil to perform similarly – altho' boil time tests are not an accurate method of measuring power output, so I am puzzled that the JetBoil performance is similar to GoGas at 25% full.
Why is Winter Gas better? I can only guess that the VapourMesh is more effective at absorbing heat from the upper wall of the canister, which would help the gas to evaporate.

[Roger Caffin]

Hi Stuart

> Why is Winter Gas better?
Laws of physics – it is not any better.
Pure spin to get rid of the batch they bought.

Cheers

[Bob Moulder]

I watched the video.

If there were some strict protocols and instrumentation in place, they certainly weren't evident. How did they determine boiling temperature/time with no temperature probes in the water? Were the stoves started at ambient temperature, and allowed to return to ambient temperature between tests? The stoves were set up so close to each other that radiant energy reflecting off one pot bottom could easily improve performance of neighboring stoves. This was not a scientific test; it was a stunt.

As far as performance, all I can say is LOL! -8°C?? With my HX strip I can use any darn canister I want and get summertime performance at -22°C, and likely far, far lower… however -22°C (-6°F) was the lowest temperature at which I was able to test this winter and that is all I can claim.

[Author]

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