Lightweight Wood-Burning Camp Stoves – State of the Market Report

Great article. For once it doesn't give me à "must have" problem since I already own a bushbuddy.

One thing I miss a bit from the report is an estimation on fuel consumption. I use my stove a lot above treeline and there fuel isn't so abundant and you don't want to take masses either. The double wall construction of the bushbuddy should make it quite efficient. Most of the time I only need about three handfuls of small sticks to do my cooking. See these posts for some hints on what fuels to use above tree line:
http://thebearablelightness.blogspot.com/2009_10_01_archive.html
http://thebearablelightness.blogspot.com/2009/08/pushing-limits-using-bushbuddy-above.html

I see here that a lot of people use fire starters. Normally I don't need that since birch bark can be found in such abundance here. Just be careful not take it from living trees so that it leaves a scar. In areas where fat pine can be found a knife and some shavings also work fine. I get lazy as well sometimes though and mostly use the vaseline cotton balls. The weight is negligible.

I understand there's no way to review each and every product on the market, but I was sad to see that the Antig Outdoors Woodlore Woodgas Stove wasn't reviewed. It appears similar to the Bushbuddy but the price is around $26.

I bought one to try after talking with Jeff at Antig Outdoors. What's beautiful about it is that it fits inside the Evernew 1-Liter Pasta Pot while it's in its stuffsack. I will admit to buying a new pot specifically to use with my woodburner (because of the soot), but I now have a self-contained system that's no larger than the pot itself.

The Woodlore Woodgas Stove weighs 6.74 ounces in the stuffsack and that includes the base. I've used it on a couple of trips now and it works well – boiling 28 ounces of water in around 10 minutes.

As mentioned in the article, your sticks and twigs need to be very dry for it to work properly, but I had success on a rainy night using an Esbit tablet in the bottom of the stove to get the wet sticks going. It took longer with damp wood, but I was able to boil my water. With more effort I could have found either dry wood or gone to the center of larger sticks for dry wood but I wanted to see what I could do with damp wood. One of my hiking buddies had a JetBoil along so I knew that I would have a hot meal even if I couldn't get the stove to behave with wet wood.

To start the fire I simply crumple a small piece of paper and put it in the stove before filling it with very small sticks and twigs (broken to about 2" long). I then light the paper from the bottom and then place the stove on its base. It seems that I always have a little paper lying around (a piece of the trail guide or map for the section I've already covered or some other trash) so I don't view this as extra weight that I'm carrying to support my wood stove.

For a short trip I know my Caldera Cone setup is lighter but the Woodlore is more fun. It does take a lot of twigs to boil a liter of water – and you have to feed the beast constantly, but isn't that part of the charm of a wood-burning stove?

Wood vs Canister for LNT.

I think the big thing with fire scared ground is that it is altering a pristine lanscape that has had minimum impact as compared to a Canister ending up in an already disgusting landfill and the tiny amount of extra propane that is required to be extrated from the ground.

In non-designated camping areas a fire scar is worse than litter. At least with litter it can be picked up and packed out.

So in terms of marginal impact. The impact of 1 piece of fire scared ground (especially above the treeline) is far greater than the incremental impact of the production, use and disposal of one Canister.

It's nice to see an article like this.

I've also got several of the stoves tested, and must say I much prefer a chimney stove like the Backcountry Boiler. When used correctly, they use less fuel (with the possible exception of the Bushbuddy), and boil water faster.
An important advantage of any chimney stove not usually mentioned is the weight advantage. Note that if you just boil water, the stove IS the pot. You don't need to carry anything else. No pot, no fuel…just the stove.

As far as tinder goes, living in the Rocky Mountains, I've never had the need to carry any tinder. Dried grasses, red pine needles, inner bark from dead trees…these things are everywhere if you learn where to look. The closest thing to tinder I carry is a small 6inch stick of 'fat-wood' that I can scrap off quarter size balls of firestarting fuzz that even lights when wet. (I've carried the same stick for years.)

I spend a lot of time in the mountain wilderness. One thing that always dismays me when backpacking is the general lack of knowledge about the outdoors most backpackers possess. They can talk about the latest ti-gear or ultralight breakthrough, but know next to nothing about the wilderness they profess to love. It's like watching aliens from another planet walking around with their self-contained space suits and gear claiming to 'experience' nature. May I gently suggest that you can't experience what you don't know.

Oh, and one last comment about boil times. If I truck camp, I'll use a chimney kettle called a Thermette (from New Zealand) to boil water. It regularly takes about 4 or 5 minutes to bring more than a full liter to a rolling boil.

Thanks for the article!

"How does cooking on a woodfire and leaving a small pile of ash (which is likely buried), or small fire scar if you will, compare to landfills full of empty steel canisters, Japanese titanium factories, chemical factories, propane production…"

Excellent point, Craig! What LNT scar does a wood stove leave on snow or river rock? We should not ignore status quo.

"titi zipper"

I have used the littlbug senior for three years now and I really like it. I use it for my group backpacking trips. Yes, it weighs 19 ozs but I find it extremely efficient even when cooking for large groups of 15+ people. I can use twigs and duff from the ground minimizing impact. It cooks quickly. And like any fire it is entertaining and keeps you warm. I don't know how weigh all of the safety factors when I have young children in the group but I feel safer with a fire than with a stove and a tank full of white gas.

Surely the Back Country Boiler should have been included in the test.

It seems that, aside from inherent issues of wood fueled stoves, all these stoves are lacking in the key requirements of safety/user friendliness: pot stability, ease of lighting and ease of feeding.
It should be possible to deign a stove that does better in these departments and then we can make an fair choice between wood and other fuel stoves based on the pros and cons mentioned at the start.

As someone who loves objects, especially gear, I understand the excitement and interest in wood-burning camp stoves. I even bought a couple over the years and they held my interest for a few days of cooking/boiling. What I found though was that putting my pot on the fire was easier, faster and lighter. It's probably cleaner too.

Granted, I live in the Tongass and there is a lot of wood. I've also become adept at making fire in all weather conditions, including the end of a week of winter rain. We make a fire for breakfast and dinner, and will have a small one for lunch if there is salami to roast or tea to drink

Most look like this

But some…

"all these stoves are lacking in the key requirements of safety/user friendliness: pot stability, ease of lighting and ease of feeding."

I didn't find any problems with any of these with the Caldera Ti-Tri with wide Evernew 0.9 litre pot, which I used on a thru'hike of the Pacific Northwest Trail last summer. I found the unit easy to use and stable. I had the alcohol burner as well (which is one reason I chose this stove) but preferred to use wood as it was faster boiling, easier to control for simmering and all round more fun.

"it takes a little longer, and the fuel I use is tiny little sticks, most smaller diameter than my finger."

I find the optimal diameter for sticks to be like my little finger, at the largest, and like a pencil, at the smallest.

–B.G.–