silicone tubing for handle insulation

[Diane Pinkers]

I’d like to insulate the handles on my Toaks 650 pot.  When I had the Snowpeak 600, I used silicone aquarium tubing on the handles.  The tubing caught fire on the bottom of my handles; I chopped back the tubing to avoid the bottom of the handles, and worked fairly well.

Is there a silicone tubing available that would be better, that is easily found at hardware stores?  Any other suggestions?  I read back through previous threads, but none of them had a post-installation description of how their idea did work.

[JCH]

I’ve often wondered if electrical shrink wrap tubing might work for this?  Might even use multiple layers. Never tried it but should be an inexpensive experiment.

[Gary Dunckel]

W have a great store in Boulder that stocks several diameters of silicone tubing. If you know the diameter of the Toaks’ pot handles, I would be happy to PIF you a foot of what you need, Diane.

Another solution might be silicone tape. This stuff is pretty useful, as it sticks to itself. You would need to wrap several layers around the handles. The trick is to stretch it as you wrap it, then it shrinks back and becomes a solid wrap. But it isn’t very cheap. Silicone tubing, with a bit of WD-40 to help it slide onto the handles, is a better solution.

[Jerry Adams]

maybe silicone caulk

silicone or shrink wrap or anything else like that won’t survive too much heat

[Ken Thompson]

Diane are you using a Calera Cone set up? If so spread the handles away from one another to minimize overheating. If it’s a canister stove, turn it down.

Tubing is cheap and easily replaceable. Shrink tubing will burn, caulk always looks like crap.

[Arthur]

I use tool dip, 3 or 4 dips over a few days to get enough Thickness for good  insulation.

[Diane Pinkers]

How does the Plasti Dip hold up to the heat, Arthur?  I read a post on Brian Green’s blog that he had tried it, and the first time he put his pot over the flames (burning wood), it all burnt away to a black powder.

One other thing I thought of was Sugru on the handles.  If I can make it thin enough, it won’t add too much weight.  A 5 g packet should work, with a little left over for the pot handle.  Anybody know how heavy the silicone tubing would be, once installed?

That’s a good point about separating the handles, Ken; I usually have them pinched together to facilitate a quick grab off the fire.

[DAN-Y]

Marco knows his stuff :-)

[Roger Caffin]

Heat shrink tubing will NOT work: it will burn.
Plastic dip stuff will also most likely burn as it is usually a rubber.
Other materials will also burn in most cases, with the exception of silicone tubing.

If what you had burnt, then I doubt it was really silicone. It might have been PVC tubing instead.

Silicone caulk probably will not burn, but good luck getting it to look like anything other than a mess!

I have held a Bic flame under silicone tubing for a while and it did nothing.

Cheers

[JCH]

Roger , thanks for the info. I’ve used silicone aquarium tubing without problem, but never really “put it to the test” either :)

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