I've included this not to presume to broaden the collecting remit of CCS from 'grown up' stoves but because it has an interesting burner design that could have applications - scaled up - for a Frankie/Mod/Hybrid stove project No manufacturer's marking anywhere, but there is a scratched date stamp (17/4/11) on a side bar - too faint to successfully photograph for reproduction here. The '7' in that date (which I suppose might denote the year as 1917 or 1911) is written in the continental way with a 'crossed' 7 which leads me to think that it was made in Germany, as many quality metal toys of that era were. The quality certainly shows. The pan is a fit in the hotplate indent and is most likely original. Quite probably there was another, taller pot (or a kettle) to accompany it when new Unscrewing the filler cap releases the fuel tank and burner assembly and refuelling is done with the tank/burner separated from the stove frame It's the burner that caught my eye, as I indicated in my opening remarks. You'll get the principle from this picture set - the priming tubes beneath the upper burner tubes containing tightly-packed string wicks, which dunk into the fuel in the tank. Holding a flame to the priming tubes warms the fuel in the priming tubes and the burner above and jets soon appear at the burner holes One burner's obviously a bit livelier with the other, but either soon had the water in the pan boiling Seriously entertaining toys in that pre-health and safety age! John
Oh my, it actually works! Wow!!! That is very cool, John! Thanks for posting that. Very, very interesting. sam
Hi John. I'm wondering if this is a salesman's sample, rather than a toy? I've seen examples of other products that were produced in reduced scale for salesmen to carry around. I wonder if it ever applied to stoves? It just seems a lot of effort for a toy. Just pondering . How does the fuel get up to the burner tubes? Do they also have a wick? Terry
Interesting what you say, Terry. I hadn't thought of that, although I'd have expected a maker's mark and a full-size stove equivalent in the catalogues by one of the makers we're familiar with - maybe? My pondering about a scaled-up version of that burner was a shade optimistic. I don't believe it would scale up successfully. It couldn't be regulated for a start, as the conventional one and two-burner meths stoves from Barthel and the rest do. The 'top' burner tubes aren't wick fed and rely on warm fuel vapour rising from the fuel in the tank, further heated then ignited by the wick-fed stubby tubes underneath in the over-and-under shotgun barrel configuration. It works because of the small quantities of fuel demanded by the burner and the compact dimensions. Again, if scaled up to full-size with a full-size burner's greater thirst for fuel, there'd have to be a more positive gravity or pressure-fed fuel supply and by then it's getting back to the conventional meths stove arrangement and away from this design, I suppose. John
Its a lovely stove and like you I suspect it was a toy. I wonder how many houses disappeared because of toys like this.
In the nine photo spread, the third photo from the left, it shows the tip of one of the burner tubes. Is that tip partially open to allow air/fuel mixing, or am I seeing something else? An interesting little stove. A metalsmith could easily make a little pot to fit the other burner.
Ooh! What a little beauty. I'd suspect a missing kettle or coffee pot. It conjures up the evocative smell of meths spilt on the carpet when playing with a Mamod steam engine in the 1950's...
Tall Paul asked, The two burner tubes with the three jet holes on the upper surface have stoppered ends The two smaller diameter tubes paired up with the jet outlet tubes are open-ended and contain a wick which dunks in the fuel in the tank The only pre-mixing of air and fuel that takes place is with air in the tank, since those burner tubes with the jets take their input of air/fuel vapour from the top of the fuel tank above the fuel level - there's an air inlet bleed hole int he fuel tank filler cap. It's not the most efficient arrangement for mixing air and fuel and it probably accounts for the fuel-rich flames, which you'll see from the photos have some yellow in them. John
