Ahem... Since Prometheus first saw fit to share the mystery of fire with mankind, innumerable ingenious devices/methods have evolved to quickly and efficiently warm food and fight off cold. This article focuses on a small subset of the fire harnessing world: small lightweight (less than 1.5 pounds) backpacking stoves that are easy to pack and would be attractive to long distance hikers. The wood burning stove technology addressed in the article includes stoves with battery powered fans, conical shapes, etc.
Currently the two primary technologies in the wood stove market are natural and forced convection. Natural convection is fancy talk for using a chimney effect, i.e. air pulled over fire, to increase a fire's effectiveness. Forced convection involves a fan that pushes air over fire. Fans push air faster than a chimney draws air, and air traveling at higher velocity means easier ignition and higher flame temperatures. While easier ignition and higher flame temperatures are desirable, they come at a cost. With wood burning stoves, forced convection means a battery powered fan, which translates to more weight, a less durable product, and decreased packability. Natural convection stoves are generally more rugged and packable, but require longer cook times. Considering this, neither of these two technologies are necessarily preferable to the other. The preferred technology is user specific, depending on the user's needs and environment.
From April to November of 2010 I tested eleven different wood burning stoves while traveling about the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness (SBW) in Montana/Idaho (see Fig 1). (For specifications and descriptions of each stove see the Individual Stove Descriptions section.)
During this time I grew well acquainted with the wood stove, and as with any product, there are inherent positive and negative aspects. Some of the pros and cons are obvious to the unpracticed wood-burner while others are less glaring. Pros for the wood burning stove include:
- Lightweight – This is true 99% of the time. However, there are products constructed with thick steel that weigh in heavily.
- Simple – Again, true 99% of the time. However, some products include fans and wiring harnesses that complicate the system and make for a less durable product.
- Good packability – Generally true, but there are bulky stoves that take up valuable pack room.
- No fuel to haul – There is no heavy, bulky fuel bottle to add unwanted ounces to the pack.
- Warming fire – Most wood burning stoves don’t give off massive amounts of BTUs (British Thermal Unit), but many do function as a decent warming fire. Those that don’t do well as warming fires still provide a base of coals that can quickly lead to a proper warming fire.
- Trash disposal – Food scraps, paper, and cardboard trash are easily and quickly burned off, putting to rest that most miserable frustration born from toting around unnecessary waste.
- Ambiance – Everyone loves staring at flame light.
- Distraction – During late fall and early winter when night falls at 4:00 PM, many backpackers are confined to the tent for 12 to 14 hours. At these times the task of feeding the fire - although mundane - is a welcome and pleasant distraction.
Cons include:
- Soot accumulation on cookware – The build-up of soot can be substantial, and leaves charcoal racing stripes on gear.
- Fuel – While there is no bulky, heavy fuel bottle to haul, wood and kindling are essential. Acquiring dry kindling and good quality wood that is neither wet nor punky can sometimes prove challenging.
- Lengthy and unpredictable cook time – Cooking with sticks just plain takes longer than cooking with pressurized gas vapors, and this time can be substantially increased if there is rain, snow, punky wood, etc.
- Fire scars – Leaving blackened patches of earth is poor form.
The pros and cons listed above provided a framework that led to the specific criteria used in this article review each stove.
ARTICLE OUTLINE
- Introduction
- Testing and Results
- Table 1: BPL Stove Ratings
- Field Testing
- Individual Stove Descriptions
- Table 2: Stove Specifications 1
- Littlbug Junior
- Table 3: LittlBug Jr. Score
- CampStove LE
- Table 4: CampStove LE Score
- Ti-Tri Caldera Systems 900 and 1100
- Table 5: Ti-Tri Caldera 900 Score
- Table 6: Ti-Tri Caldera 1100
- Fire-Spout 100 and Fire-Spout-Mini
- Table 7: Fire-Spout-Mini Score
- Table 8: Fire-Spout 100 Score
- Sierra Zip Stove
- Table 9: Sierra Zip Stove Score
- TrailStove
- Table 10: TrailStove Score
- Evernew Titanium DX Stove Set
- Table 11: Evernew Ti DX Stove Set Score
- BushBuddy
- Table 12: BushBuddy Score
- Nimblewill Nomad's Wood Burning Stove
- Table 13: NimbleWIll Nomad Score
- Conclusion
- Results
- Discussion
- Final Comments
- Appendix A
- Table 14: Field Testing Notes
- Table 15: Controlled Experiment Notes
# WORDS: 7560
# PHOTOS/TABLES: 25
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Discussion
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Please see the editor's note at the beginning of this article, as well as one corrected photo. Thanks for bearing with us!
Warmly,
Addie
Anyone have any experience/recs for wood stoves for large groups (eg a church backpacking group of 10-20)?
We've been using Whisperlites, which may still end up being the best option as we boil lots of water for dinners (gallons) and drink tons of coffee. It also rains a lot (we're in South Carolina) so finding enough dry wood could be a challenge in certain circumstances.
I agree that there is great potential for a wiki development project here, sorting out the goodbad elements of each stove or type of stove, combining the best in a usable, hopefully myog,"best of all possible worlds" stove.
The LNT debate tends to arouse a religious fervor in some souls, but it is certainly a good goal to have. I thought to suggest buying a fire blanket (standard 4'x4' here ), which can be cut up into fourths; use one of the pieces under your cook place to reduce trace and fire dangers. Around here, one can nearly always find a bare rock or sand to set up on.
The ash from a wood fire is largely potassium oxide, which goes back into the cycle pretty fast. What is lost is nitrogen and phosphorus (as pentoxide)but they return partly in the rain.
I'm surprised there's been no discussion so far about the stoves (three in this study) that can burn alcohol, where there is no wood available.
I'd like a stove that can burn wood when I'm below treeline; but that can also burn something else (alcohol and/or Esbit cubes) when above treeline.
The Ti-Tri burns all three (wood, alcohol, Esbit) and seems to get great reviews here. But now the Littlbug Jr. has my attention. Has anyone used the alcohol component of this Littlbug stove? How has it been working for you? Does it easily accommodate Esbit cubes as well?
The wood-only stoves are non-starters in the Sierras above treeline, and for much of the PCT in general.
– Elizabeth
I have used the tri tri inferno with the base for 2 years now and never had any issue with leaving any trace burning wood on any surface the stove has been set on.
"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…"
I certainly have no problem with subjecting all stoves to the same criteria. That alone should put canister stoves out of business or at least force mfr's to charge a deposit large enough to guarantee return for re-cycling. However, I doubt that a fully enclosed wood stove would lose to an open campfire if only owing to risk reduction.
I think human impact is an inevitable product of our existence, and the best we can do in the near term at least, is manage it. The minuscule increase in titanium or steel production and concomitant environmental impact is more than balanced by the reduction in damage — elimination of fire scars and virtual elimination of campfire-caused forest fires — a fully enclosed stove affords to the lands we've set aside for protection an preservation.
"Fire scars" sounds like a joke to me. Or yuppy propaganda. I can tell you from experience of coming back to the same place, 4 days a week, for a whole summer that if you build your fire, stomp the coals into a fine powder, and kick some dirt over it, nobody will ever see it again.
The biggest mistake is leaving massive coals that stay there for years. If you stomp the coals into a powder, the rains disperse it. Designated fire pits and camp sites suck a location dry of wood, while leaving the rest of the forest cluttered with dead wood. Building a fire in the same place over and over again is what leaves a trace. Dispersed, responsible fire making and covering the coals is the most LNT method of making a fire.
And I have seen oak saplings grow out of a massive pile of coals. Don't buy in to all the LNT propaganda. Go out and see the effects of things yourself and operate by your own terms.
Then again, I hike mostly in well forested, backwoods areas in national forests, so different places may vary. I definitley wouldn't condone blasting a huge fire in the thin treeline of the high sierras.
I have been using the 180 Stove for a couple of years. It uses such a small amount of fuel (twigs) that if I scrape a little soil aside, cook, douse, and then cover, it leaves no scar at all. No ash. No coals. It is much more environmentally friendly than fuels stoves that leak or fill the landfills with canisters.
What I really like about this stove is that it is rock solid, seems that it will last for many years, and is priced under $50. It is stainless steel so is not quite as light as the titanium stoves, but is still lighter than stoves with fuel. And it folds flat with smoky parts inside. Works for me, and I can even grill on it if I want.
Pics and Review
In case anyone wanted more info on the stove. Great review BPL, spot on!
Soooo… according to this test it looks like I wasted money buying the Inferno option for my Sidewinder. I wonder, what does Trail Designs think of these results?
Well, I'll have to run my own tests. I find it very hard to believe the Inferno actually REDUCES boil times.
I have a lot of narrow oak moulding strips so I can just cut a bunch of 3 inch pieces and see what happens under very controlled conditions.
P.S. I'll post test results here.
Jay, do you have a link to the burn-off?
Any plans to update this or do a new one? It’s been 8 years since this came out and a lot of new wood stoves have hit the market since then. I haven’t been able to find any wood stove reviews on this site since this one.
Yes! It’s on our 2019 editorial calendar!
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