Greetings, All, Here is the second stove I bought yesterday. I know, I know.... I have denigrated this very type of stove in the past!! But, for the price, $9, I decided to jump in and see what they are all about. http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=87136&item=5196442092&rd=1 Any of you ever use one of these "bastard stoves" before? If so, what's your opinion and what experiences have you had with them? I'll play with mine, when it arrives, and post an opinion. Talk to you later, and God Bless! Every Good Wish, Doc Mark
Doc I think you may need a bit of review. Is it possible that your honour is slippppping. I mean buying a thirty (30) cent stove for nine (9) dollars?? Okay' your honour isn't gone but "something" is on the go. Sweet Bride had better get home soon or you'll end up wasteing all her hard earned cash. lance
CAN STOVE-- Doc--i made a bunch of these a couple years ago as xmas gifts for canoeing buddys...it was a good evening project for the dark,wet fall and early winter evenings we have in Minnesota--i drank a few cans of very good ale from Scotland in order to get a can that was just the right size for the Pepsi can to slip over..the cans are very easy to cut..just a score around the can body with a razor knife and a push with your thumb will make a even,clean cut..a tack hammer and a package of sewing needles to punch in the "jets" around the can bottom--if you punch them in in clock order they will come out even with out having to measure--like 12--6--9--3-- and then between each of those untill done---JB weld works perferct for sealing everything up.. i have used mine for a tea boiler on day hikes and it works fine--just don't expect it to boil like a 123--the instructions in "thru hiker" are very detailed and i used them without a hitch...i have a few that are not assembled yet..if you send me your address in a private post i'll mail out one for you too mull over before you try it on your own..
LANCE-- thats what i thought too--but by the time you buys the JB weld--a fresh pack of razor knife blades--a 6 pack of pepsi--a couple 4 packs of that ale from Scotland-- a pack of needles--my wife chased me away from her sewing box--you have spent 20 bucks---thats why i ended up sending them out for xmas --i was going to just make a couple for myself but ended up with a assembly line...
Doc I have one sort of similar. Fill the burner with meths, drop it in the middle of the can as below Light and away you go. The little doohickey on the right is for putting it out. Very simple piece of kit which I think is more or less like the Trangia thingies that everyone keeps on about. I can remember using it years ago for brewing up when, my then SB to be were making our love nest habitable.
Hummm, what would be the name of that fine beverage that costs so much. Pepsi cans are everywhere on the street, needles and a sharp knife i have so where is the expense. Ohhh yeah the JB Weld. hummm some nice guy trucker will have some to share if i can't find the tubes i bought last year. 'enry, that looks like a coffee can as we have them on this side of the pond, I think i just found the perfect wind screen for my smaller stoves. Dave; "thru hiker" isn't that the site by Monte Dodge? lance
Hey, Guys, See.... just like I said, I'm getting grief over my new "stove"!! Yeah, I know I could cobble one up for myself, but have you seen my workbenches, lately?? I fettle most of my stoves on top of the washing machine, 'cause my benches are piled so high with stuff, I can't even see their surfaces!! Also, like Dave mentioned, by the time it would take me to gather all the stuff to make one of these, I may just as well support someone who has already made a business out of making them. Dave's gonna send me a "kit", and that should be more fun, and much faster! Thanks, Dave!! "Time" is one thing I have in short supply these days, so, when I would much rather spend my free time talking to you Gents, than looking for supplies. In the same time it would take me to find and buy all that stuff, I can make something in our business that will sell for "considerably" more than the $9 I spent on one of these little "bastards"! And, like I once wrote, I'd never trust my life to one of these, especially when there are so many other wonderful "real" stoves out there. But, just the same, it will be fun to give them a try. One bought, the other made from Dave's "kit"! Cool!! 8) Take care, and God Bless! Every Good Wish, Doc Mark
Henry, the little silver painted picnic stove you have (I have one myself http:// ) is not like the "Trangia thingie" those of us in the know talk about. The Trangia is a different class of burner and stove kit, buy a trangia, use a Trangia, and you will soon withdraw this sweeping statement and comparison of yours (no offence mate ) Doc, I have a couple of these soda can stoves from Chuck, he makes them, and makes them very well, but they are at best a noodle boiler (small packet to boot)
Hello ! I agree with rik: what Henri showed is a "PicNic Handiware-like". But it is a very powerfull meths stove ! Mainly the little ones. I performed some tests with several meths stoves: Retec, Trangia, PicNic, Optimus-meths, Sherwood, ... The protocol is: same kettle, 1 L (1 3/4 pt) water at 20? Celsius. no wind. Here, you see the PicNic (The big one) and the Ideal-Express (the little one) on test: |imgRemoved| [/img]|imgRemoved| The little one is better. But... What are 2 minutes in a day or in a life ? I think that, for those little stoves, the thermal inerty of the water is very big and makes the differences little. In my opinion, a Sirram kettle with a Trangia burner (the most efficient) is a good combination... PS: It is right that the Trangia has a purple flame !
I made mine from a 7 Up can (non Diet) but as I understand those made from beer cans are much better . I didn't use J-B Weld or aluminum tape on mine, I just squoze it together and it worked. I'm looking at it as I type and yeah, I can stand on it too. If I was to buy an alcohol stove, it would either be a Vargo titanium or one of those really ornate ones that go on your dining table. Let summarize Doc's recent purchases: an Optimus 80 last weekend for $3 and a recycled soda can for $9 Then again, I just bought an Aladdin lamp for a whole lot more and I can't see how the mantle attaches. Anybody?
Hey, Rik, Thanks for the shout. I sort of figured that the soda can stoves were for minimalistic cooking chores. Most long distance backpackers are NOTORIOUSLY underfed!! They try to stay alive on next to nothing, figuring that less food means less weight. As I've written before, Sweet Bride and I home-dehydrate all our own backpacking meals, and they SMOKE just about any meals you can buy for the trail. I would want, and need a stove that can actually cook. "Cooking", to me, means working in all climates and elevations, boiling water fast, and then simmering, nicely. If a stove can't do that, then it isn't really stove... for my needs, anyway! Still, and all, I'm looking forward to messing with these pop can stoves, if for no other reason than the fun of it. If I had to choose to rely on a burner of that same genre, I'd take a Trangia in a heartbeat, over the pop can stoves! It is a proven design, works well, and built like a tank. It's few more ounces of weight would be more than worth carrying. Thanks, again, and I'll talk to you soon. Take care, and God Bless! Every Good Wish, Doc Mark
Catogan, I agree, a couple of minutes is nothing really, but where the Trangia 25, 27 and the Swedish Army sets really perform is in wind; you can light a Trangia in a storm; no other wind guards needed 8)
"I'd take a Trangia in a heartbeat, over the pop can stoves! It is a proven design, works well, and built like a tank. It's few more ounces of weight would be more than worth carrying." ... and you can carry it around full and ready to go.
LANCE-- The expensive beer is Belhaven Scottish Ale..from Dunbar Scotland.. the can is about a third larger than an American beer so i guess you pay a third more--well it's really twice the price..but..i kind of got it because it was from the "old country" and the can is just a hair smaller across than a pepsi can,so the pepsi can will fit over the cut off beer can bottom and make a tight seal... the can stove thing is really out of control,,i think it got started by guys who were living on the Appalachian Trail and digging around in dumpsters in the towns they passed thru for food and gear... Thru Hiker--i don't know how much Monte has too do with that site..but when you google thru hiker lots of stuff comes up..the main site has gear reviews and such..
Hey, guys, One question about the pop can stoves, though I think I can guess the answer. Do they blacken your pots, like the Trangia type burners do? I'll bet so. One of the several reasons that the Optimus 81 Trapper is my most favorite alcohol stove, besides that fact that it boils faster than other alcohol stoves, cooks longer, and can simmer, is that it does not blacken your pots. Instead, it coats the bottom of your pots and pans with a cooked-on "brown" that does not really wipe off onto everything, as does the sooty black coating from an open alcohol burner. How's about it, Folks? I would think that the pop can stoves would be similar to a Trangia in that respect. Thanks, and God Bless! Every Good Wish, Doc Mark
Mark, I made mine on a whim and only lit it to see how it burned. The stove itself didn't even blacken, as I pick it up, it's clean. What alcohol are you using? Denatured alcohol should burn fairly clean, Isopropyl is a lot more sooty.
Hey, Russ, I use only Methylated Spirits in my stoves, which is fairly clean burning. But, my experience with direct burning alcohol stoves mirrors what Colin Fletcher used to say about them, that they copiously blacken your pots. He was talking about Trangia and Svea alcohol burners, and that's what I tested, too, way back when. Both of them blackened my pots in usage. It will be interesting to see how the pop can stoves do. Like I say, after my sooty experiences with the Trangia burners, I was amazed at how clean the Optimus 81 Trapper burned. But, that stove does not burn the alcohol directly, but rather burns the fumes, in a chimney setup. That is the reason it doesn't blacken the pots. I'll have to do a direct test, I guess, when the pop can stoves arrive. I'll use the same alcohol, and similar pots. Then, I'll do a side by side burn test of a Trangia 25, an Optimus 81, and Optimus 77, and a pop can stove. Except for the 81, all the other stoves burn the alcohol directly, and so we'll see how they stack up in usage. Cool! 8) Talk to you later, Russ, and God Bless! Every Good Wish, Doc
IIRC, the soda can stove also burns fumes. You fill the center with alcohol and once it ignites the burner holes around the outside top, you're burning fumes. The fuel between teh outer and inner walls becomes pressurized. Then when you put the pot on the stove the center is just a reservoir and the burner ring is what does the cooking, fumes only. That was my understanding of how the soda can stove worked. Am I mistaken? I might give mine a shot tomorrow and see what it does.
