Hi all, this is my first post on the site (lurked for a couple of years though) as my main interest is in meths stoves, so not much to do in the way of fettling or restoring to be done or questions to be asked, up until now. I have just bought my first pressurised incendiary device and I'm finding myself a little out of my comfort zone. The stove in question is a Soto Muka which runs on unleaded. My question is; will this stove run on panel wipe and would this burn cleaner than unleaded petrol? I have read here that it tends to clog up using petrol. My thanks in advance. Dave
Welcome aboard ! I always have some trouble with fuel names in different coutries, is "unleaded petrol" white gas, or car fuel ? If it is the second one, I recommend you to switch to white gas ( or Coleman gas or naphta based panel wipe, or Aspen 4 fuel), car unleaded fuel has parts of additives bad for health, and for the stoves !
Hi Dave and welcome aboard! You are quite right that car petrol of any type tends to clog up the burner because of the various additives. Panel wipe is fine as long as you get the right type. The water-based one is useless. For a small amount of money extra you can get Aspen 4 (which is pure petroleum for 4 stroke engines as opposed to Aspen 2 which is for 2 stroke engines and has oil added). It is usually available from places that sell fuel for petrol lawnmowers, hedge trimmers, strimmers, etc. The Aspen UK website is here. It has a stockists locator. Of course, you could mortgage your house and buy some Coleman fuel, but the Aspen is just as good.
aspen 4 all the time for me. there's always a chance that the motor factors will sell you panel wipe with rust inhibitor in it, or silicon removing agents or as trever says, a water based one. aspen 4 is pure as can be and manufactured specifically for clean burning, not degreasing car bodies before paint.
Crikey! that was quick, Thanks for the warm welcome gents, looks like a trip over to Huddersfield for the Aspen 4. again my thanks. P.S if any of you get the urge to sell any meths stoves please let me know
Welcome again Dave. I think you have just set the record for the fastest subscriber after the first post. I know you will have many years of help and friendship from the members of CCS.
I think I owe the site. I have been lurking around since I bought a varik stove on flea bay a few years ago. The seller was Kawa550 I'm not sure if it's the same person as the gentleman on here but he was responsible for giving me the stove pox
you'd think so. yes. but there's always that chance. the one's i've (successfully) had in the past have been unclear as to their exact contents. some have been entirely without markings. obviously the flammable warning sign isn't on the water based ones.
I'll add my welcome too. The chap you've mentioned is Bryan and he's a regular - and very knowledgeable - contributor here sure enough, responsible for getting many of us interested in the hobby and staying interested. The Soto Muka as a first pressurised stove no less! I've used one for a while and wrote about it here The pump is the most complex part, metering fuel/air with a sophisticated rotary drum valve, incorporating sprung-loaded detents and umpteen O-ring seals, unavailable as spares. People here will confirm that I'm not one to baulk at stripping stoves down and fettling them but I hesitate at the thought of doing that with the Muka pump. Consequently, to keep that pump in the best of health I use the best available fuel (Aspen 4 or Coleman fuel) and wouldn't resort to unleaded fuel since I couldn't be sure of the effect of the additives in it on those O-rings or on the fine galleries in the pump rotary valve. Panel wipe? Trevor's explained the importance of getting the right sort, but for a bit more outlay and for the same reason I've explained concerning the pump, I'd take no chances with that either. John
Thank you again for the advice, especially regarding the pump. I ended up in Keighley today and bought myself 5 litres of Aspen 4, below is the result. Delighted, so I am.
Really easy to set up and get going, I'm very impressed with it. It will be run exclusively on Aspen 4.
@limesgmt Another benefit of the Aspen is that it doesn't reek like pump petrol does and if you spill a bit what smell there is doesn't linger when it's evaporated. I took another look at your photos and the pump control wheel on yours looks different from the one on mine. Could you take a close-up photo of it? I'm wondering if there was another version of the pump. Yours ... Mine ... I've remembered that the internals of the pump are depicted in the video on the Soto Muka website entitled Difference between Muka Stove and ordinary liquid fuel stove. See what I mean about the complexity and reliance on seals?!!
@ presscall, it's not the best picture, I had to take it with the mobile. I ordered the Muka from Australia as it was in a sale, I may have an older model. I'll have a study of the internals tomorrow.
@limesgmt Thanks for posting the photo. I wonder if I can see faint markings on it equivalent to the markings on mine? Without markings it would be impossible to be sure what function the control knob is set at. Does the control 'push-pull' in-and-out to carry out the command marked on the knob? Is there a click-stop (detent) to mark each function as the knob is turned? Sorry to be a pain, but it's intriguing to see the variation in design.
My apologies in the delay in getting back to you. There are markings on the dial but they are really hard to see. I have been using the stove at work this week and I have to put my reading glasses on to be able to see what I am doing, it is still a bit of a struggle in bright sunshine. I have had numerous attempts to try and photograph this for you, all I am getting is the dial itself, I'll sort something out with the markings as soon as I can. The click-stop is identical to yours and the dial does push in and pull out. The one thing that I have noticed is the lack of "pumps" to pressurise the bottle. The Aspen is filled to the correct level and the red marker is visible well before the 100 pumps that is said to be required for the stove to work that I have read elsewhere. I might email Soto and see if I can replace the dial, yours looks far better.
@limesgmt No matter about the photo, the one you took and your confirmation that markings are on it but indistinct explains things and I'm grateful to you for taking the trouble. Curious to have that variation. It must be like you suggested and was an early production version - perhaps revised for the reasons you've explained about the markings being hard to see. The '100 pumps' the makers recommend to pressurise the bottle is way over what it requires (thankfully!) and I've found that too. If you get in touch with Soto let us know what they say.
