I continue to investigate stove fuels and designs for my sailboat. Reading in several boating forums, one time and again reads vague rants against pressurized alcohol stoves causing fires due to "flare-ups". I assume they do not mean the pre-heat process... that flame should be no surprise to anyone who has read the instructions. I'm guessing they are referring to breaches in the pressure system causing fuel leaks and spills that ignite. My basic question is the frequency / risk of a pressurized stove (Kenyon / Homestrand) failing. Has this ever happened to you stove hobbyists? What is my risk if I use a pressurized alcohol or kerosene Homestrand? To hear the sailors tell it, I'd be running a grave risk but I'm guessing this audience is somewhat better-informed. Regards... Hank
Very strange... I know gasoline is out because the fumes sink and gather in the bilges to blow you up. Kerosene is probably not used because if it spills, it smells. If you see an alcohol fuelled pressure stove it is almost certainly for marine use. With fresh seals, especially for the nonreturn valve in the pump there should not be any fuel leaks. I guess it is like running gasoline in a 111, if it is in poor condition you could easily get a fireball but with a proper fettle it is fine. There is one person here, I forget who, who runs alcohol in a 111 for canoe trips. He would be the one to tell us about how to keep the burny stuff on the inside.
Hi Hank I seem to recall that you've asked this question a time (or two?) in the past. I'd suggest this link from West Marine: http://www.westmarine.com/webapp/wc...d=-1&storeId=11151&catalogId=10001&page=Stoves I agree with the operator error comment above. Alcohol or kerosene (if managed incorrectly or used in an unattended or improperly operated stove) can cause fires. But, gasoline or propane can make boats explode. If you are the sort of sailor who's always fussing about making sure everything is shipshape and in top notch condition aboard, then I would think a liquid fueled alcohol or kero stove would be no issue. If not... then maybe some problems. Might I respectfully suggest that you purchase a stove and set it out on your back porch with a fire extinguisher nearby. Practice cooking all your meals on it for two weeks. Evaluate the use of the stove after that time. Did you have "flare-ups", leaks, overflowing spirit pans, fires? How would your two-week trial have done if it had actually been on your craft? Oh! Sorry. Didn't answer your question. No. I've never had a properly maintained two burner alcohol or kerosene marine stove leak. But, then I'd be the sort of sailor I describe as fussing about. Cheers, Gary
Every stove type, every fuel, every BRAND of stove will have its detractors in loud and raucous chorus. As I see it, if the stove is in good fettle and handled with appropriate respect, it's a safe stove, otherwise the company that made it wouldn't have lasted to make more than three of them. Whether or not you like a given stove or fuel or brand is very much a matter of personal preference. I've used propane, white gas, and kero on my boat (and am about to try alcohol), served aboard boats that used butane, diesel, alcohol, wood, and coal stoves, sized as light as an MSR Whisperlight and as heavy as an Aga four-oven, and while I could complain about many of them, and rant about unsafe usage or maintenance issues, they all worked, and none of them had (last I checked) sunk or even damaged their boats. BernieDawg has it about right, as I see it: buy it, try it for a while, see how you like it. It all comes down to personal preference and personal dedication to maintenance and safety. Alex
Heya Alex I gotta tell this story. I was on a very lovely 42-foot charter sloop earlier this year. Owner/operator was a very nice lady and excellent sailor who seriously knew how to sail her vessel. Inevitably, conversation comes around to "what do you do"? Well, I sez, "I mess about with stoves and make little gizmos for them." She: "Oh! Stoves, huh? Well, I know that having an alcohol stove on board is very dangerous which is why I changed over to propane." Me: "Oh, ok. But, don't you thinking the little frilly curtains directly above the three-burner in your galley might be a fire hazard?" She: "Well, I have to cover the starboard ports with *something*, don't I?" Safety. It's all in your head. Cheers, Gary
I rest my case. My favorite marine stove is still the 4-oven Aga we had aboard the 88' schooner Bowdoin. What a beast! They'd had to lower it into the forecastle in pieces and assemble it in situ. Apparently it kept the whole boat right toasty, even on cruises down to Newfoundland and Labrador. I think it might have weighed more than my entire boat. Alex
Gary et al... I had asked similar questions but here I was trying to get details on any actual stove failures / accidents some of you may have experienced. What failed and how dangerous was the incident? Thus far, none reported. And I have cooked (part of) perhaps 20 dinners on my alcohol stove on a granite kitchen counter without complaint or incident. It is the near-universal vehemence with which sailors diss pressure stoves that makes me wonder if I am missing something.
The dangerous stove problems I have heard of and experienced (from a distance, thank Fortune!) have all been related to propane. Beyond those often-fatal experiences, my problems with kero or white gas have been either too much priming in the spirit cup due to inattention while letting the cup fill, which results in soot on the overhead and cussing (and is entirely operator error), and condensation and/or green crud in the kero tank when the stove has been let sit idle too long, which can be solved by occasional draining/flushing of the tank. I have experienced no hazardous issues (not maintenance-derived) directly related to a stove being of the pressurized type. My further reply is also a question to Gary, who knows far more than I about such things (and to other stovies who fall in the same category): Perhaps the common dislike of pressurized stoves has to do with their somewhat greater need for maintenance over unpressurized stoves? (I don't know if they *do* need more maintenance, but I can imagine that might be a perception.) Or perhaps simply a knee-jerk fear of PRESSURIZED stoves being MORE EXPLOSIVE! ? I simply don't know. I *do* know that if there's one community where dogma and myth mix in febrile abandon it's the sailing community. I'd say pick a stove you like, treat it with respect, and go with it. I sure raised some eyebrows here when I first arrived, talking about using my white gas stoves aboard boats, but I've never had even a hint of a problem. My shift to kero was due to two factors: my desire to have a single-burner gimballed "sea-swing" style stove, for use under way (the stoves built along the lines of the Op45 are most adaptable to that arrangement, and they're either kero or alk), and the desire to carry only a single fuel aboard (and since my running lights and riding light are kero...). With Herself now sensitive to the kero smell I can no longer just carry one fuel aboard, so I've shifted to an alky Op45 that will still fit in the same gimballing as the kero stove. Fuel choice or pressurization aren't safety concerns, stove maintenance and safe operational practices are the safety concerns. Sorry if that sounds like a rant; I really don't mean it to. It just sounds like you're taking in as much info as you can in order to make an informed decision for your own stove, so I thought I'd offer what has gone through my head throughout that same process. I expect whatever stove you go with will have its problems and its vociferous detractors, but so long as you like it and know its foibles, who cares what others say? Take comfort from the fact that if you blow yourself up, there will be as many people scratching their heads saying "well how'd he do that with THAT stove?" as there will be people shaking their heads in sorrow saying "if he'd only known to stay away from THAT stove..." Alex
Greetings, Hank, Please remember that "most" boat owners really know very little about stoves, and most rely on rumor, fiction, and unsubstantiated, and often blatant BS to make important decisions. I found the same kind of BS back when first getting into stoves for backpacking. In many books wind magazines on backpacking equipment were replete with such errors and misinformation, some of which I strongly believed until I became a member here at CCS. Here, you can find the straight poop on pressure stoves! You can trust the info you learn here, with your life!! For what it's worth.... Take care, good luck, and God Bless!! Every Good Wish, Doc
Two other possible problems with pressure stoves that I just remembered: I've always been a bit shy of over-pressurization, to where the SRV trips. That's never been a problem for me, but I've always been pretty careful how much I pressurize the stove. That's probably a hold over from running white gas stoves. The other thing is under-priming, where you haven't gotten the generator hot enough, but the flame looks just fine at first, so you turn it up to full roar and --POFF-POFF-POFF-POFF-POFF!!!-- you get bursts of yellow flame that, in a small space (i.e. a galley) can be pretty startling. The flares always seem bigger to me when it's a white gas stove, too. No big deal, as you're probably aware of --just turn down the flame and let the generator warm up a bit more-- but if you're already a bit shy of burning fuel, it might be pretty unpleasant and give a stove a bad reputation. Alex
Oh, I don't know that I'm a boat stove "expert". (But, thanks for your perception, Alex. ) I do have a bunch of boat stoves, though. Some are pressure-feed, some are gravity-feed. All seem safe to me to have aboard a vessel of my own (if I owned one) *under certain conditions*. (Back to that in a moment.) And, I'm sorry if I side-tracked the thread, Hank. I had another post put together that I binned and then redid into the reply I did post. If I may be indulged, let me add from memory some of the thoughts I had in my original post. In my experience around sailing vessels and motorcraft, alcohol is used almost universally and, sometimes, copiously. Not to burn, to drink. Vacationing boat owners love their grog, dontcha know. Some folks are better at managing their alcohol use than others. Personally, I would cook dinner on my pressurized stove before cocktail hour rather than the other way round. I'd bet I'd be the rare sailor in that regard. I'm thinking I could see some potential for fires and accidents arising from besotted sailors who are not up to the minutia of safe pressure stove operation. (Nothing against drinks, by the way! It's just that all the boat-related accidents I witnessed or heard about from my youth involved alcohol consumption rather than burning.) Stove pressure 'Twere me, I'd not leave my pressure stove pressured up when not in use. Release the pressure after cooking and when the stove has cooled, say during washup, for example. No pressure, no pressure leaks. Pumping the stove is good exercise. Preheating Preheat the burner with the kettle on and there is no "leaping flame" if you mess up. Another thought on preheating. The Optimus 155 I'm fettling has little preheaters on it. They emit a little blowtorch of flame directly on the burner, so no leaping flames of a bad preheat. Don't see why a feller couldn't accomplish the same thing by using a piezo-started propane torch to directly heat the burner on a stove that doesn't have preheaters (most of them). Galley Keep the area clean and free of flammables - like lacy curtains. Have two fire extinguishers nearby. Ritual My lovely spouse spent ten years as an aerial camera operator (aerial photographer). Airplane people have all sorts of checklists they go through in order to get the plane in the air. A wise/safe sailor has the same sort of checklists/rituals in his/her mental tool kit. Cooking with any sort of fuels on board should have similar checklists to avoid accidents. Boat Owners In most States, boat ownership involves nothing more than slapping down a credit card/check and registering your boat. No training is required to be a boat "owner". Some owners think they are sailors because they bought a boat. I think there are a lot of boat owners that have no clue on a wide range of issues with respect to their chosen craft. Do they have problems? Sure. Do they talk about their failures to all their pals and develop urban legends about certain topics? Yup. Two factors to consider with respect to safety on or around boats: It's much more dangerous (statistically) to drive your car to the moorage. It's much more dangerous to have a gasoline-fueled motor or other device on board. Google "boat explosion". I did. Twenty-one *million* hits. All of the first two pages I scanned were gasoline related explosions. On boats, just like in the rest of life, you have to manage your risks. Do what you feel comfortable with, don't do the other stuff. Googling Bowdoin gets you some really nice photographs, excellent history and super-duper video of a fine and historic craft. Alex, you're a lucky guy to have been able to sail aboard her! I recommend others do the search. Awesome stuff. And, Hank, sorry if I got too wordy again. Hope this helps in some way in your decision. Now I'll go away and stop blathering. Cheers, Gary
Thanks all. Very interesting posts and they confirm what I suspected but it is nice to hear the validation... boaters are not stove experts and common wisdom may be common but is not always wisdom. I'm confident now that a pressure alcohol or kerosene stove will work fine for me. We like the Homestrand 126 alcohol unit but I will also obtain a kerosene stove for comparison. Whichever one we don't put on the boat will get use during our frequent winter power outages... cooking, even making coffee on a coal stove, our primary winter heat source, is a pain. And Gary, I would know nothing about grog aboard a boat.
Hi, It is interesting that Gary mentioned the possibility of pre-heating kerosene burners using a propane gas blow-torch. Check out this earlier thread: https://classiccampstoves.com/threads/5877 Best Regards, Kerophile.
