So I bent over for my own curiosity and bought one of these. It needed some fettling before it would run properly. Man this piece of equipment is a case study of badly/not thought through solutions and clumsy design! The stroke of the pump is 30mm and it delivers about as much air/stroke as an asmatic mouse coughing. Don't drop the filler cap down the stove when refilling. It wont pass the tank to a place where there's room for your fingers to retrieve it! If they have to include a NRV key and an extra NRV with the stove, then the design might not be super To remove the stove from the tin requires a spanner of special design to hold the nuts, not included. So field servicing is a no no, despite the spare can holds an extra screw/washer/nut. And mind you, there's no access to the jet unless you tear down the whole stove! As the pre heat cup is hidden and impossible to watch properly overfilling is "mandatory" and then the bottom of the tin fills and a big Bowlfire starts and migrates under the tank. Uh I love that, NOT! The lid has instructions riveted inside so it's not possible to use as a heating vessel, unless it's an emergency. The pump is positioned in such a way that it is only possible to use with your left hand, if you try to use the right there's no where for your fingers to go but to scrape against the 2 control knobs. Genious The main/flame control wheel is made from pheniloc plastic and is about as slippery as a politician at election time. Placed so low to the tank that no grip will give more that 1/5 turn at any given time. The spares tin contains: An extra NRV, a screw with washer and nut, 2 pump leathers and some sort of steel wire brush, for which I can think of no use on a petrol stove I could go on, but you deserve some pics.
Heres some pics from the fettle to show just how backwards this stove is designed! To remove/insert the burner is some sort of mind twister game, and the only thing that holds it in place is the spirit cup.
Henrik, very enlightening observations/ tutorial. I was eyeing one such as that but never thought it to be a tad complicated to service or even to light up. Lovely flames and now need to know if it passes the tea test. With your knowledge perhaps you can modify the pump by fabricating an extended pump rod if it will not get in the way of anything without the cover and a key much like the primus's in order to turn the control knob or extending the spindle rod. Am sure you can figure something out. Then again if it's just a collection and not a regular user, then leave it the way it was designed. Nice find by the way. Ron
I bought two of these stoves from the Militaria show at Malvern a few years ago. One was a delight to use and ran well on panel wipe. I primed it with meths rather than fuel from the tank, it is very easy to overfill the rather large spirit cup and end up with a bit of an inferno! The second was a time bomb waiting to go off! While boiling water in the garden for a brew it suddenly burst into flames . A quick bucket of water and a shovel full of top soil put it out. After cleaning I found the tank had split in two places...... Be warned..... Stuart
Thank you for the report CT! You have saved some of us from buying/risking this stove in the future. I really liked the look of it.
That things looks like it embodies the spirit that's behind most of the older French gear that was issued to conscripts : tough and cheap, but with a design that seems purposefully unfunctional, as if it was all done to toughen the mind of the guys using it. Since the army has gone professional an odd decade ago, that's mostly a problem of the past.
It's defenetly a keeper! When i get fed up with one of my other stoves this "gem" can come out and reset the scale. Same as my car, a '84 WW van with 1/4 mil km on the clock, when i'm to fed up with it, i use public transport for one full day and love my car deerly again! When i think of the umpteen thousand M1942's and Coleman 530's that lay around for reverse engeneering after they got whooped for the second time. It boggles my mind that this is the epiphany of their development apartment and of 1952 design.
Hi Henrik, I noticed there was a flame underneath the burner. Is that part of the 'thermal feedback' process. In some ways it looks like underburn, but then the flame pattern looked normal. Any blue flame (light) you could shed on that? thanks, just curious, sam
Hi Sam, check out what Motoshi writes in this much earlier post on the "interesting" French Military stove: https://classiccampstoves.com/threads/4224 Best Regards, Kerophile.
Good spot! I also thought underburn, but when it does that it sounds way different. It is in fact a preheater nad visible here.
It looks like a camel .... the parts are well made, but they have been individually designed by a committee and then forced to work together.
Quirky is a good adjective, I think. While we're bashing France... Ebay listing for an early 20th century French Army Rifle said "Never Fired!!! Only dropped twice!!" HA! Just kidding. I worked with the French military in Africa for about a year. They were some of the best disciplined and well trained professional warriors I've ever worked with and I would be proud to fight along side them. Mike
Still a pity they and all our fighting forces, is'nt backed up by the finest quality money can buy! They get the most overpriced items that the military will accept, not the best
Just a joke- It is said that Napoleon wore a red undershirt so that if he were wounded, it would not be so obvious. In keeping with this tradition, to this day the French military wears brown trousers... ;-)
I think that's universal to some extent. The coalition forces I worked with were shocked and amazed at how much stuff the U.S. forces bring to the party. But they actually do a wonderful job with what little they are allotted. The influx of modern quality equipment the we(U.S. Forces) have gotten since 2004 boggles the mind. When reports of our boys getting blown up for lack of sufficient armor and countermeasures for IEDs started hitting the papers, things changed fast(blindingly so in military procurement terms). But, I fear that when it's no longer front page stuff, the faucet will be shut off until the next time our shortcomings are exposed by a resourceful enemy. Mike
