[at-l] Drink Can Stove Experience

[ultrajtr@earthlink.net (Jack Richardson)]

My PCS a.k.a. CCS are the same design. I have made over a dozen. 2 oz.
burned for 18 to 22 minutes. That is without a pot and  inside without a
windscreen. I plan on rehydrating my food before cooking. That will cut down
on the time required to cook dinner. I hope to be using 3 oz. of alcohol per
day, bkfast and dnner.
tumbleweed

-----Original Message-----
From: at-l-admin@mailman.backcountry.net
[mailto:at-l-admin@mailman.backcountry.net]On Behalf Of Stewart Holt
Sent: Thursday, March 22, 2001 11:25 PM
To: at-l
Subject: [at-l] Drink Can Stove Experience


I had planned to build one of the alcohol stoves for a long time. When the
Tin-Can-Stove-Man posted his offer, I took a look at the plans and set out
to build a few of them. I am going to describe how it works and what it does
and my experience using it on a two day trip. Here is the article on the
stove, http://www.pcthiker.com/pages/gear/pepsistove.shtml. Looking at it
will give you an idea of what I am talking about. This is a Pepsi can stove,
but living around Atlanta, I had to make it out of Coke cans. I am convinced
that the cans are identical.

The stove is made from the bottoms of two drink cans, fitted together, with
a cylinder of metal between the bottom grooves. This forms a center area for
pre heating the stove and an outer ring to fuel the burner. The fuel is free
to flow between, but as it runs low, the dome keeps it to the outside. The
dome is cut out of the top can and holes punched around the edge. The thing
even looks like a stove burner!

When you put an ounce or two of alcohol in it and light it, It burns from
the open center opening. This heats the very thin metal stove quickly and
the alcohol starts to vaporize rapidly and rise out the ring of holes. There
are soft popping sounds and in about a minute (the more alcohol, the longer)
it will be giving off a nice flame from the burner holes. Vapors continue to
rise from the center and are pulled into the burner ring to form a ring of
fire. As the stove burns, it gets hotter and the flames get higher. (Didn't
Johnny Cash describe this?) The alcohol actually boils when it gets fully
going.

You need two other items, something to hold the pot above the flame and a
wind screen. I made a circle of hardware cloth about 1 inch smaller in
diameter than my 1.3 l pot. I could cut a lot of this away to save weight.
The wind screen was made from aluminum flashing material made for roof work.
Something lighter would be better. After bending the flashing into a circle,
I put it in the oven at 550* to anneal it, so that it would not fly open at
every chance. This worked well as did the smoke alarm which told me that
this material has a coating on it. Now the wind screen wraps nicely around
the fuel bottle.

When I put 1.5 oz of alcohol in the stove and lit it, it burned for 17
minutes, With the windscreen in place and a pot on top, it burns only 8 to 9
minutes because the contained heat vaporizes the alcohol more rapidly. It
boils 32 oz of room temp water in 6 to 7 minutes. This time is of little
concern, but the way the stove gets hotter and hotter was. Near the end of
the burn, flames would come a couple of inches above the top of the pot.

I have mostly used one of the Gaz stoves and like it because I can simmer
meals which have dried meat and rice to let them fully cook and soften. I
knew I would have to adapt to use this torch. I spent two nights on Capers
Island, SC which required only a 1 mile hike from the boat drop to camp, so
I brought both stoves. I never used the Gaz. To prepare a meal made from a
beans and rice mix and dehydrated meat, I put 24 oz of water in the pot with
the meat and about 1 oz of fuel in the stove and lit it. It brought the
mixture to a boil. I left it for 30 minutes. At that point, I added the
beans and rice mix and brought it to a boil again. I used more water than
usual to reduce the risk of burning the mixture to the bottom and stirred
it. After the flame died out, I let it sit a while and then served it up.

After eating and scraping the pot and bowls, I used another 1.5 oz of
alcohol to boil more water for hot chocolate and the final wash of the pot,
bowls, and cups. This is done with about two drops of soap and a cold water
rinse.

So for dinner we used about 3.5 oz of alcohol. We did breakfast oatmeal, hot
chocolate, and wash with about 1.5 - 2 oz of fuel. I was hoping to use less
than that. 5 oz per day seems like a lot. It is not as weight efficient as
the Gaz fuel is. I am sure the butane/propane has much more heat content per
ounce. Since you can not put out the stove easily, using exactly the needed
amount of fuel is the way to go. If the stove burns out, it can be refueled
in a relatively short time as you can pick it up by the bottom and blow on
it to cool it.

We were very impressed by the little stove. I think I will take it as the
only stove on my next trip. I will probably take two of them, in case the
wind blows the first one away or I sit on it! The stove travels in the pot
with the stand. I used a 16 oz Nalgene fuel bottle which is made of red
plastic and has a nifty funnel in the top with a vent hole to control flow.
It weights about the same as an aluminum bottle and is very nice for
pouring. For a long trip, I would need to carry more than 16 oz. I would be
interested in others experiences on fuel consumption.

The only improvment would be a way to moderate the burn rate. I tried a few
things such as capping the center hole after it gets going, which did
little. I did float the thing in a cat food can of water which did add a few
minutes to the burn time. I think I could use less fuel if I could keep the
flames more under control.




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