Stoves Part III

Stoves Part III

Major Brand Production Stoves:

I have tried a wide variety of stoves and found every one to have it's advantages and its disadvantages. I'll try to share some things I've found with production stoves. These stoves must meet criteria not found in some of the smaller stoves I've written about. These stoves must adhere to certain safety requirements you probably won't know about if you're building a penny can stove. There's been many years of R&D in these stoves and I'm sure there are more lawyers who have had their say than engineers.

MSR Whisperlite 

When I worked at REI this was the stove I chose above everything else on the market. It was 1986 and I had just gotten out of the National Outdoor Leadership School. Because I worked at REI I was able to speak with stove manufacturers and test out their products. After 27 years I just went out and bought a new stove... Yup, you guessed it, the same exact model I bought in 1986. After all this time the MSR Whisperlite is still on the market because of it's size, power and reliability. This is the shaker model, because when you shake it there is a little pin which cleans the jet. If I'm going out for a long haul I bring a repair kit they sell and once I even had to use it. This stove is incredibly powerful. I had been doing a summit ascent on Mount Adams in Washington State and it was about five below when we set camp. As the sun was setting I boiled water and cooked pasta in about 10 minutes, as I was eating it ice crystals were forming on the food as I brought it up to my mouth. 

After trying various stoves by building them and experimenting with various manufacturers to try to cut weight I've come full circle and found myself back at the MSR Whisperlite. I can not recommend it highly enough. The only gripe I have is when it's folded up it's an awkward shape and you can never seem to get it to pack neatly in your backpack.

Pocket Rocket

The Pocket Rocket is one of the smallest and lightest stoves on the market. It works well and as long as you have a stable base it will support a pot easily. The only drawback to these stoves which use canisters of fuel is that they sometimes have problems in the extreme cold. I haven't tested these stoves in a long time and I've read that they are better in the extreme cold but I'm still apprehensive. Having said that if you're in a warm climate they could be a good choice for your 72 Hour Bag because you can throw a canister in the trunk of your can and not worry about fuel leaking.

Jetboil Zip Personal Cook System

My buddy and I went hiking between Christmas and New Year along the Sespe River. I had my Whisperlite stove and he had his Jet Boil system. I was impressed with how easily it lighted and how quickly it brought the cup to a boil. It was indeed faster than my Whisperlite and it packed into the cup very neatly making it very appealing for its simplicity.

Stoves Part II

Stoves Part II

Wood Stoves

Wood stoves are great because you don't have to pack fuel, which like water will become the heaviest thing you carry. They are light weight and pretty simple to use. The downside is if you are out in the rain you might not be able to get a fire going, this will be when you'll have to employ some good wilderness survival techniques at finding dry wood to burn AND get your fire going in a damp environment. In addition you should collect any fuel you will need before heading above the tree line. It would be a great idea to have experience with your stove before heading into an area such as that so you'll know how much you'll need for dinner that night AND breakfast the next morning... will you have to purify water using a boil technique? This should factor into your fuel collection as well.

Vargo Stove

I love this stove, it packs down to nothing and is flat in your pack, there's a little door you can open to feed the fire when the pot is on the top and it's design not only focuses the heat upward but when the flame is larger it flows through the cut out V's to surround your pot, heating up the water faster.

Solo Stove

The Solo stove is an excellent little stove which seems a little more efficient than the Vargo because it has a double wall and creates a vent to feed the fire with oxygen. there is a small opening in the collar at the top which acts as the pot stand allowing you to continually feed the fire. This stove comes with a little stuff sack and weighs very little. It's built pretty solid and if you can get a fire going, it's pretty fool proof. 

Kelly Kettle

The Kelly Kettle is a stove a buddy of mine has and while it is not the lightest weight cookset in the world its unique design makes it probably one of the fastest to boil times. The set comes complete with a lower portion where the fire goes and the upper portion which is the kettle. In addition, you can get an attachment which sits on top of the kettle and allows you to cook foods for longer periods of times. This kettle has a hollow section in the middle of the kettle which allows the fire below to flow up through the kettle, using the kettle as a chimney. By doing this the water in the kettle is heated from the entire inside out, not just the bottom like when heating a kettle on a regular stove. The only drawback from this cookset is the size and weight. It stands very tall so you have to make sure you are on a stable platform before beginning to cook. It's also very large and may not really pack in a 72 Hour Bag. It is worth mentioning here though because it is probably a perfect choice for your home earthquake kit or for when you take the family camping.

Below is a picture of the Kellykettle and a close up of the pot stand attachment.

Rocket Stove or Hobo Stove

There are two types of stoves you can build from found items like tin cans. They work best when you build them out of number 10 cans but they can be improvised out of any size can if need be. The principal is simple, there's an area for combustion, a way to get good air flow to feed the fire and a way of feeding the fire with fuel. They all should have a way of setting a pot on the top of the stove and be stable enough to support a pot or a cup with at least two cups of water. The Rocket stove is far more efficient but takes a bit more work to make, above the link will take you to a YouTube video on how to make the stove. There are also ways to make the stove using just 16 bricks and nothing else. Another advantage to the Rocket stove is it burns the fuel at a hotter temperature and there isn't as much smoke.

Below is the simpler Hobo stove. This stove can be made with nothing more than a knife and a can. It helps to have two tent stakes to run through holes at the top of the can which become the stand to set your pot. Anyone who has built a campfire and then wrestled with the riddle of how to get your pot over the fire and not spill the contents of the pot know having a pot stand built into your stove is invaluable. This stove is only slightly more efficient than an ordinary campfire because it uses vents in the wall of the can to feed the fire with oxygen. It also helps keep your fire contained and by having the one large door allows you to orient it into the wind which helps to keep the smoke down. Here's a sample image from practicalsurvivor.com.

Stoves, A Three Part Series

Three Part Series

Over the next three posts I'll cover SOME stoves available. There are a ton of stoves you can buy and a hundred times that many in designs on the web you can look up. I will cover home made and small production pressure stoves in Part I. In Part II I'll cover stoves which use found fuel such as wood and pinecones. In Part III I'll cover stoves made by major manufacturers and meet mountaineering safety guidelines. I'll try to fill you in on my experiences and what I like and don't like about their designs.

Part One:

Even if you only have emergency rations and MRE's with heaters you are still going to need a way to boil water to purify it. There are ways as I discussed in an earlier post on how to do this without boiling, but it is best to have the ability to cook food or boil water in your back pocket. If you are savvy and know how to build a campfire, then boil water you'll be good to go. If you don't you may want to look at getting a stove. There are some that are so light weight you'll never notice they are in your pack. Let me go through several I have built and others I own. I'll try to run down their pros and cons of each.

The penultimate resource for building your own stove is zenstoves.net there is every type of stove and how to build it imaginable on this site.

Pressure Stoves

Pressure stoves use liquid fuel. When the stove is heated up with some of the fuel used as a primer it turns to vapor creating pressure for the gas to escape through small holes. As the gas is released it ignites and continues the process until the fuel is expended. They are very efficient stoves and incredibly lightweight. You can make then out of two aluminum cans. When you get the hang of it you can turn one out in about 15 minutes.

Penny Can Stove

It's called a penny can stove because at the top of the stove you put a couple of holes. This is where you fill the stove up from, then you literally lay a penny over the holes then pour some fuel into the depressed area (normally the bottom of the can) and this becomes your primer bin.

Below is a picture of a penny can stove before I sealed it with engine sealer. You can see a little bit of the flame coming out from the middle right where the two cans overlap. After sealing it up this little guy ran for about 15 minutes and would bring two full cups of water to a boil in around eight minutes. It weighs virtually nothing and I've found the best fuel to pack in the trunk of your car is the yellow bottle of Heet Fuel additive. I like Heet because it's in a bottle that won't leak in the trunk of your car and this type of fuel is perfect for a penny can pressure stove. There is great debate over which gives you a faster boil time, alcohol or Heet. I've tested them and I can tell you - who cares, they're about the same. Use what's easiest for you to acquire and keep safely in your car.

There are issues with a stove like this. You need to create a separate pot stand and it only burns for a limited time so cooking pasta is out of the question.

Vargo Outdoors

I love this stove. It's a production model of the Penny Can Stove and has a couple of features making it worth the money. It allows you to put a pot right onto the little legs which unfold and make a base for the stove and your pot. It also has the ability to burn Esbit Solid Fuel Cubes tabs... A fuel I hate, but when push comes to shove, they'll save your life. The flaw in this stove is it can be a tab bit unstable if you're using a large pot. The maximum amount of water I put on here is two cups and if you learn to use it properly you can make it more stable. The bottom legs should be used as spikes and driven into the ground, not as legs. This makes an excellent platform. If you are on rock or wood, you can't do that and have to be careful. All in all I give this stove an A-.

Jet Coil Stove

These stoves are a little more complex to create but have a little better boil times than the pressure stoves. Technically they're still a pressure stove, when you heat the coil it turns the liquid fuel into gas and feeds it into the coil using a wick fed through the bent tubing. I had to build a jig to bend the tubing:

                                                            

The real trick is to fill the tubing with sand so it won't kink when you bend it on the jig. I've experimented with building different types of jet coil stoves and have had some good results with boil times. The draw back is having to build a pot stand to go with the stove. By the time I came up with a good windscreen and pot stand I came back to the Vargo above. I've built both the screw on lid style and the penny can/ jet coil hybrid pictured below. The best part of the hybrid is the cool screw fill spout.

Knives Part II

Folding knives

The folding knife is a great way to have a very good performing knife and be able to tuck it away into your pack or pocket. There are many types of folders which allow you to open them easily and when open many (all that I own) will lock in the open position. Below are two I find to be extremely utilitarian and hold a great deal of quality.

The Benchmade Mel Pardue-

Notice it has a textured grip, a serrated portion, a straight blade portion and the back of the blade is flat. Making it easy to use a log to hammer the back of the blade to split wood or other tasks. I love the locking mechanism and I can open and close this blade with one hand which I feel is an incredibly important feature. There have been many times wher I have only had one hand to use my knife while holding on to an object. When a task is complete I can close this knife and stow it back in my pocket without ever having to let go of said object.

The Gerber Gator Serrator-

This knife is similar to the Benchmade but has a locking mechanism on the back of the handle. It also has a sharper point at the tip which I feel is actually a drawback in survival situations. Pointy tips break easily. Having said that I have had this knife since 1994 and those of you who know me know I use knives to their full extent so if it's lasted this long then that's something. I do not abuse knives though, I wouldn't use a knife as a screw driver, which would be exactly what would break this tip. My favorite thing about this knife is the rubberized grip. It holds firmly in your hand and isn't cold to the touch even on the harshest of days on your bare skAnother drawback though is that with this rubber handle it is tougher to get in your pocket and if I hadn't lost the sheath for this knife it probably wouldn't bother me. 

Spyderco-

The Spyderco has an interesting take on the one handed opening. The common thread through most all Spydercos is the big circle at the top of the blade. This is where your thumb goes to open the blade by pushing forward away from your palm. The locking device is on the back of the handle so you kind of need two hands to close it which is interesting because rumor has it the original Spyderco was invented either by or for a guy with only one hand. I can't really open it well and I'm always more frustrated with this knife style so I avoid it. 

Fixed blade knife

Fixed blade knives can be much stronger than folding knives but they should be full tang, meaning the metal from the blade should carry all the way through to the end handle. 

The Kabar-

This is the classic survival fixed blade knife from the military, there have been many incarnations of this knife from the simple to the complex where the sheath and the knife snap together and work as wire cutters. The best part of this knife is you can often pick them up at surplus stores and they're  pretty reasonably priced. I've seen them anywhere from $35-75.

Benchmade Adamas Fixed Blade - 

This is an excellent knife because it balances functionality and weight. It's incredibly strong and very versatile. Below you can see the skeleton handle. Mine is wrapped in 550 cord which can hold up to... You guessed it 550 pounds. The blade snaps into the sheath and can attach almost anywhere. It has a long straight blade and the back side of the blade is serrated. Because of the holes it can be fashioned onto a stick and made into a spear using the 550 cord from the handle. The only drawback I have experienced with this knife is that because the serrated back edge is so sharp you can't use a piece of wood to hammer the blade while trying to split wood. It just attaches to the piece of wood your using as a hammer. All in all though, this is my go to knife for back packing. 

Multi Plier/Swiss Army knife-

If I were trapped on a deserted island I often wonder if I'd want to have a multiplier or a fixed blade knife. It's a good debate I run in my head from time to time. I really can't answer the question, I think if I were, I'd just be happy to have either. The Multiplier offers some great advantages with the amount of tools which are packed into the frame. The downside is the weight. They are heavy, but that's a price you pay for such a great toolbox in your pocket. There are three major brands I have owned, Gerber, Leatherman, and SOG. They're all pretty good and last count between these three there were about 500 different models to choose from. Here are some I like:

Gerber:

Here's an image of the gerber I have. I like it because it has a knife blade with a straight and serrated edge, scissors and a multi material cutting blade which works well on metal and wood. Gerber offers a ton of different multipliers all geared towards specific tasks. Anywhere from fly fishing to bomb disposal. I like that there's a locking mechanism for every tool in the knife and the pliers deploy with a flick of the wrist. Here's a link to a similar unit for $49 Gerber Compact Sport Multi-Plier 400 Tool.

LeatherMan:

LeatherMan offers similar knives to Gerber but has an opposite orientation. The tools are available on most units immediately from the folded position and the knife must be opened to reveal the pliers. You have to judge what you'd rather have fast access to. The tools or the pliers, it's your world. Below is the Squirt Ps4, I think this exact model is out of production but it's the one I carry in my EDC. I love this little guy because it's micro small and is the perfect tool to use as a needle driver when suturing wounds. It's also rock solid for most tasks where you might need a little knife in the field. There are new versions which are slightly different but have the same theme.

SOG:

The SOG has a similar theme to the LeatherMan and also comes in a wide variety of models. I include it here because my wife owned one and I was always impressed at how rugged it was. I don't have much experience in the field with it but I feel its worth mentioning, the company started in 1986 based on the knives that outfitted special forces in Viet Nam, that knife was the MACV-SOG. Since 1986 they've been manufactured just north of Seattle. I'm not sure if they are still 100% made in the USA but they are worth considering. 

Eric Haney - Hardware store knife

When working on The Unit I asked Eric Haney what type of knife he would mostly carry on missions. I was expecting he would tell me about some fancy hand crafted knife special operations gave him. Instead he told me they would usually go to a hardware store and buy a cheap butchers knife. It comes with a paper sheath and they would tape that to what ever rig they would be wearing. This presents a good opportunity for you to look around your house and rummage through the knife drawer to see what's lying around. When I go running into wilderness areas I take this little pairing knife, not sure my wife knows I absconded it yet (it's been 3 years now). It's super light weight and snaps into the sheath.

Rambo Knife:

The survival knife was really popular right after all the Rambo movies came out. These knives are appealing because they have cool stuff built into the handle and look like they are the solution to all your woes. AVOID these knives at all costs. The hollow handle is ripe for disaster, the knife is usually the cheapest metal - it's just not worth your time.