Using sticks to boost alcohol/solid fuel into colder weather

[Kyler B]

Hey I would like to move away from isobutane canisters as much as possible. I just don’t enjoy storing them, carrying partial canisters and find them awkward to ration fuel for trips. For group trips they are still going to be my first choice.

I was wondering if anyone has used sticks to boost their solid fuel/alcohol system into the shoulder seasons (temps in and around freezing). I don’t really like to ration fuel in these temps. Found that alcohol really wasn’t worth the weight savings in these temps. My local is the Canadian Rockies and I find that their is always kind of dead sticks on the bottom side of live Douglas fir, balsam, and other trees that tend to stay dry and burn okay.

my thoughts are that a half cube of Esbit or 1/4 oz of alcohol would get the fire going fast enough to eliminate waiting too long for a wood fire to get hot. You can always use the fire to dry things out while you have it going if you want or in my locale very easily put it out quickly with surrounding water and snow.

So tell me your experiences, methods and gear setups. I have never used fire to boil water in an ultralight backpacking scenario.

 

don’t plan on trying this during the high fire risk summer season.

[Edward John M]

My own wood burning set-up doesn’t qualify as ultra light. I simply use an A-10 tin can with a hole in the bottom and a couple of nail holes through the sides to take a couple of tent pegs. My old aluminium billy sits inside on the pegs and I just light a little stick fire in the space.
it’s a low cost bare bones hobo stove but it works well enough if I keep the fire small and it is more efficient than an open fire and a grill supported on some rocks.

[Jon Fong / Flat Cat Gear]

Alcohol / Twig burning.

Long story short, it can be done however there are a lot of downsides.

I experimented with this a few years ago.  Keep in mind that I was keeping the volume of twigs very low.  I found that mixing twigs and a small amount of alcohol, could help to conserve fuel.   The problem was that the fire burned at a very low rate; 2 cup boils in 12-15 minutes.  Additionally, you get kind of a smothering burn, not a real fire.  Then you generate soot on the pot and get that wood smoke smell everywhere. It seemed a better idea to bring enough fuel or plan on a wood stove.  My 2 cents.

[DAN-Y/FANCEE FEEST]

You can have all my stick burning info on my website:

http://bplite.com/viewforum.php?f=60&sid=569466a96d45656a0b6f9f1bd80a4b82

[Kyler B]

Jon,

Thanks this is the info I’m looking for.

Was this adding twigs into the alcohol stove?

maybe a minimal solid fuel stove would work better?

[Jon Fong / Flat Cat Gear]

Kyler – for my experiments, I place a small grate on top of an open reservoir alcohol stove.  I add some fuel below and placed a few twigs on the grate.  The idea being that the alcohol would burn off first and as the flames died, the twigs would finish the job.  With a few twigs, I just got a small flame that was never very hot and it took a long time to boil.  More twigs and you are better off using a wood stove.  IMO, for emergency use, it may be ok but not something that I would count on out in the backcountry.  There are much easier ways to conserve fuel.

[Kyler B]

Jon

thanks for the info. I will probably just use a bit of fuel and make a actual fire if I have the want or need I guess. I rarely make fires anymore.

what are these easier ways to conserve fuel?

Not really concerned about conserving fuel so much as I wanted to boil more water in one sitting during freezing conditions.

[Jon Fong / Flat Cat Gear]

Not really concerned about conserving fuel so much as I wanted to boil more water in one sitting during freezing conditions.

 

Sound like a good use of the TD Ti-Tri to me.

[Author]

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