Cold Canister: I've got this problem licked

DRATS! I forgot about the super-annoying BPL tripwire “feature” of not being able to edit the first post,… grrr….

I want to add… This technique is used in concert with my HX Strip method of cold-weather canister operation. The “Lick Trick” gets it going long enough for the thermal feedback from the copper strip to take over canister warming duties.

As always, I am looking for the simplest, quickest, most hassle-free way to accomplish things.

I think I’d rather just urinate on the canister than lick it.

Nice!  Now you just have to train Cyrus (Bob’s dog) to lick the canister for you…

Your other option would be to put that morning pee that you’ve been keeping nice and warm all night in a quart ziplock (hopefully that’s big enough) and then set the canister on it…

CAUTION!
This is a well-known problem in the Antarctic, where the temps can get quite low. You touch bare skin to metal and your skin instantly freezes onto the metal. To detach … you rip skin off. You would look very silly turning up at ER with a canister frozen to your tongue.

If you can’t be bothered using the water bath technique, perhaps winter conditions are not for you?

Cheers

Nope. Cyrus is smarter than that. Dogs can smell trouble, you know, with their noses.

I learned about what happens when I was in the first grade. We were lingering in the playground after school on a -25* F January afternoon, and my little impish buddy, Jere Huffman, said, “Here’s a fun thing to do, try it.” He pretended to stick his tongue on the cold steel frame of the swing set. So I did, and he gave my head a little nudge forward. And there I was, with half of my tongue stuck to the steel. Then he laughed and ran home. It was dark about 45 minutes later when my dad showed up, looking for me. He grinned and said he was going back home to get something. Man, it was cold, and my tongue hurt. Dad brought a Thermos of warm water and he thawed things out quickly. My tongue hurt for a week, and I never, ever did that again.

What’s up with you, Bob? Haven’t you got some other orifice where you can warm your canister? Or a Bic or something? Jeez…

Well maybe I’d best keep this technique to myself. Seems it is in the realm of winter Zen mastery and not advised for most people… maybe like cobra ‘charming’, which the Indian practitioners make look easy?

There is most certainly some finesse involved, much as there was when I used the same method to separate tent poles at -25°F. I am going to try it at lower temperatures when the opportunity arises.

But I can understand if nobody else wants to ‘come along on this ride.’    :^/

I can just see the neighbor telling his wife, “Looks like the Moulder kid is playing with fire again. And look, he’s licking some round steel thing to see if his tongue will stick to it! That boy will never amount to anything.”

But in all seriousness (and I mean seriously serious seriousness), I think that this is purely a hoax. You know, like when the Idester gets bored and spins a tall tale that is almost, but not quite, plausible. So little Bobby M thought he would pull our leg and see how far it could go. I expect that Cyrus is hiding somewhere, with his paws covering his muzzle, embarrassed for his master as much as a dog can be.

when I used the same method to separate tent poles at -25°F. 
Spray the joint zones with silicone spray before the trip. It works very well as a release agent. Mind you, aluminium in ice is always a serious problem, as it STICKS. (My poles are CF tube on SS joiners: no problem.)

Cheers

I think I’d rather just urinate on the canister than lick it.

Whatever you do, don’t mix the two methods!

Walt

My canister felt rather cold

And I was feeling rather bold

So I slid my tongue across its base

And a worried look soon crossed my face

‘Cause that damn can grabbed hold of me

My tongue was stuck, it wouldn’t free

My pup just sighed, then turned an ran

He wanted nothing to do with that can

It took a bit of water, warmed

To keep my tongue from getting deformed

And as I pondered my silly lick

An idea formed, I’d play a trick!

So I hopped right onto BPL

And began to cast my wicked spell

‘Lick your cold can’ I said with glee

It really works, try it, you’ll see!

I mean, why should I be the only clod

With a nearly frostbit tongue, by God!

Now I wonder how many other mates

Were foolish enough to take my bait

It’s fun to imagine what I might have started

You see, a fool and his tongue might soon be parted…

Thank you Doug …

I’m honored to have inspired verse by Doug I  ;^) Well done, Sir Douglas!

But rest assured, I am quite happy to take some measured risks for the team and bust some myths along the way, lol!

I can’t wait for much colder weather, and I’ll do the next tests on my deck with a container of warm water nearby. However, I think the reason this trick works is because of the comparatively low mass of the canister which warms up much more quickly than the metal pole on the ski lift. At 17°F there was absolutely zero tendency to freeze tissues with the small canister (which was full of fuel, BTW).

What made me think of this was remembering drinking (carefully sipping, actually) Jaegermeister that was -25°F without suffering any cold injury.

Well mates, at least this thread isn’t a Gear Swap listing, eh? ;^o

Pile on!

You could look up the specific heat of butane and steel, get the mass of both in a full canister, and use that to figure out how much heat is going to be sucked out of your tongue to get the butane to the temperature where it will evaporate, but I don’t know where you’d find the figures you’d need in order to calculate whether the heat will get sucked out fast enough to freeze your tongue to the canister.