Backpacking Stove Efficiency, Part 1: Pot Diameter, Burner Size, Flame Level

[David Thomas]

In one of those small-world things, Dr. Dale Andreatta was cited in that video.  We overlapped at UCB, specifically in the UC Hiking Club and many of the caving trips we did in the early 1990s (since we was the biggest caver, we rated caves in milli-Dales with 1000 milli-Dales being the smallest passage he could navigate, albeit with some blood loss).  He was working on his WAPI wax-filled capsule with a sliding washer around the capsule to document that water in a solar-heated tank had reached pasteurization temperature at some point during the day (when people might have been in the field).

He was trying to improve the efficiency of a heat exchanger that pre-heated the next batch of water once pasteurization had been achieved and the hot water could be drained.  He could get tubing that fit inside each other for a tube-in-tube exchanger but it wasn’t very efficient.   I pointed out that there’s a material, for free, in every third-world country, that would greatly improve the HX efficiency – coarse sand placed between the two tubes.  He tested it and it doubled the HX.

[obx hiker]

5″ or 13 cm reflectix circle weighs 4 gm.

3.5″ is 2 grams.

That’s the only 2 cut out circles to hand presently

 

[Author]

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