A funny story about two Coleman 502 stoves and a horrible vacation

I can see what you said, and totally agree with you.
Until it happens in the field.

Personally, I am not one to pick up a 'bigger' set of pliers to work on a stove. If I have the stove, then I mean to care for it as if it were in my collection. I recently had a 502 I was working on, and that was when I realized that it is not one I want to rely on.

I saw a guy brutishly grab something on an Enders 9065 with pliers. I cringed as the tool left huge marks. He said "It's mine, so I can do as I wish". I had said nothing, but, I think he knew what he was doing.

Patience is a key item in the toolbox.

 

@Jim Lukowski I see what you mean now that they're not powerhouses... I tried one of them out and boiled some water for potatoes...boiled but not roll boiling...definitely not complaining as other stoves I have are like blowtorches and if not boiling water I think regular food would burn

 

@snwcmpr I agree with your statement "Personally, I am not one to pick up a 'bigger' set of pliers to work on a stove.", but if one is using enough force to bend the bowl, it's way too much. This is where patience is needed as well as heat and/or penetrating oil. Plus, this is at the outer rim, so if there were any tool marks, they should not be visible. Maybe I have a special relationship with 502's.

 

Like I said. We totally agree.
But heat and penetrating oil is not field maintenance.

One time, mid 1990s, we were at Camp Muir at almost 10,000 ft on Mt Rainier. We had 2 stoves between the 4 of us. The sun went down, behind the mountain, and it got cold fast.
The canister stove would not work.
The MSR Whisperlite was not working either.
John (Leader) said, well we are eating cold dinner.
I said, I had read that the Whisperlite is "Field maintainable". I had never seen an MSR stove up to that moment.
After a bit of debate/argument John agreed that we should look at the Whisperlite. We pulled the cable, and most likely pricked the jet. After reassembly it worked great.
John said he learned a lesson to not give up, and to look at things before tossing in the towel.

If I do not have the tools to fix a stove not working, it better have a backup plan, or I eat cold dinner/breakfast/coffee.

 

Other than taking off the generator for cleaning, one can go years or even decades with no need to remove or dismantle the burner. If I recall correctly the only time I've ever done that is when totally reconditioning stoves I've purchased in used condition. It was mostly to clean the area under the burner and repaint the tank.

 

Coleman 502's are EXCELLENT stoves. Their performance is so close to the stoves we all have in the kitchen. The pot support is impressively sturdy. It can hold a stable simmer for ages and ages. The carburetor and the lack of priming is fantastic. Fuel consumption is slow and long lasting. After heavy use, the generator is easily cleaned. And I for one am a big fan of the low power output. You can actually cook a meal on a 502. I have enough stoves that can boil water quickly, but a stove that can easily and conveniently cook eggs without welding them to the pan, and toast bread without turning it into charcoal really is special.

As for not field serviceable, I don't care. I do the servicing beforehand. Not once have I had an issue that required the burner ring to be removed unless I was tuning up a a recently acquired stove. If it's sealed from bugs during storage, then you'll never have to worry about removing the burner ring. I for one exclusively use automotive gasoline in all of my 502's. I've probably ran 100 tank fulls of autogas through one of my 502's (I used to use it with the drum to warm up my room)
And besides cleaning the generator more often, I've NEVER had a major issue. The 502 is exceptionally reliable, it just needs periodic maintenance. I do wish it handled autogas better, like my shmel 4 does. But I can live with cleaning a straight tube generator every once and a while.

Yeah 502's are AWESOME

 

>>a stove that can easily and conveniently cook eggs without welding them to the pan, and toast bread without turning it into charcoal really is special.

@BenniHanna Welding eggs...charcoal toast... That's a great visual!