Alchohol stove in the cold??

runningboar said:
Skunk,

Mine has fiberglass in it and I do believe it helps, also instead of drilling your holes trying using a push pin tapped with a light hammer or the back of the leatherman, helps to make smaller holes. Chris
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Hey Chris,

Thanks for the re-assurance on the fiberglass.

I read about different sized holes and went with a recommendation I read for big flame/fast boiling. For simmer-cooking , and longer flame the tiny holes have to be better.

I've got much much smaller index drill bits...or I can just chuck a needle or pin into the drillpress and set the depth real shallow. ;)

I think I'll stairstep holes smaller and smaller and see where the performance changes.
 
45-70 said:
I bought a bottle of everclear, store it in one of those spun aluminum bottles.The stove runs well so far.
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That is expensive fuel, on the plus side with a little tang or powdered lemonaid you have an after ramen cocktail.:D

I use a small listerine bottle for a fuel bottle, it is nice and flat and packs well, it is light, you can use the cap to measure your fuel, and best of all it is free. Chris
 
Hey Guys...

Skunker..

The yellow flames are coming from water in your 91% Iso...
Go with denatured alcohol from the paint department at a hardware store,, and it'll burn cleaner...

Or the Yellow Heet also works well..

Running Boar..

What did you use for fuel in Iraq ??

Do they have alcohole there, or did you import it ??

ttyle

Eric
O/ST
 
AAFES (Army Air Force Exchange Service) follows the soldiers virtually everywhere, they even have PX vans and conexs in the most remote camps, and they always had rubbing alcohol. We got care packages with all kinds of things like easy mac, soup, beanie weenies or what have you and we had no way to heat them up. I started out trying to figure something out with JP8 but quickly discovered that cooking over open diesel flames wasn't a good idea, so I used some of my valuable internet time to look at plans for alcohol stoves and started experimenting. Chris
 
runningboar said:
That is expensive fuel, on the plus side with a little tang or powdered lemonaid you have an after ramen cocktail.:D

I use a small listerine bottle for a fuel bottle, it is nice and flat and packs well, it is light, you can use the cap to measure your fuel, and best of all it is free. Chris
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Chris,

I think the reason the yellow HEET bottles became popular with the hikers are the same as you mention, flatness , easy to pack, take up very little room.

The Everclear is sounding better and better as a "Multi-Fuel" ;)
 
Since y'all seem to be very knowledgable on this subject, I thought I'd ask a general question about alchohol as a fuel...

I was at REI awhile ago and was looking at the Trangia alchohol stove. I was reading the instructions and, IIRC, they said to add 10% water to the fuel, which I believe they recommended denatured alchohol is best...

Do any of you do it?




(Runningboar - besides your knowledge and ingenuity, my thanks, also, for having gone and made it back! May you never have to face anything like that again...)
 
The added water (10%) is to reduce sooting from the denatured alcohol. I wouldn't bother adding water in cold weather to the alcohol.

There is very little sooting, if any, with a quality alcohol.
 
I must say I am intrigued by all these homemade stoves. Being Swedish I grew up wth Trangia and other alcohol stoves and I knew you could make your own burner and tampered with a couple of crude ones myself many years ago, but I had no idea it was the latest craze in America. I have been looking at several interesting web sites and stoves today. I am fascinated by stuff like this that is improvised from junk. A strange and interesting trend it seems.
 
Hey Guys...

Bohica2u said:
The added water (10%) is to reduce sooting from the denatured alcohol. I wouldn't bother adding water in cold weather to the alcohol.
There is very little sooting, if any, with a quality alcohol.
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I agree completely...

I think you get a better burn with a better quality alcohol..
I haven't had any sooting with Yellow HEET,, or with Methal Hydrate...

We can't get de-natured alcohol here in Canada, and high octane drinking alcohol is very hard to find if at all...

I think all they sell here in Canada is 90 proof

Instead what we have is Methal Hydrate,, which burns very well,and is clean...

I've used it for years in small home made alcohol lamps..

ttyle

Eric
O/ST
 
So i just built one of these neat little stoves and i was wondering how important it is to tape it together when your done. The last step to the directions i used said " Pull 300 mm (12 in) of High Temperature Flue Tape off the roll and cut it in half lengthwise giving you two pieces of tape 3/4 x 12 in, which is enough for two stoves. Trim an inch off each end to have a clean, wrinkle-free piece. Tape over the slits and the junction of the top and bottom sections. The straightest edge of the tape should be the upper edge and should be placed right at the shoulder (rounded edge) of the section with the burner holes. As you install the tape, burnish it by rubbing with your thumb, but don't push too hard and put a dent in the stove." I don't have any "high temperature flue tape" lying around...how important is this step? if i cant skip it where might i get this tape or are there any other tapes i can use?
 
copied this from -------> http://www.ultralight-hiking.com/stoves-trangia.html

Denatured alcohol (‘methylated sprirts’, ‘meths’, ‘solvent alcohol’) is made mostly from ethyl alcohol or ethanol and some added methyl alcohol or methanol. To make a food grade ethanol undrinkable, methyl alcohol (this was mainly wood alcohol which is methanol derived from fermented wood) is added and it thereby separates it legally from alcoholic beverage products, with all of its associated implications (taxes, laws, places that can sell it, people that are allowed to buy it, etc.); or

Isopropyl alcohol is available as rubbing alcohol, which is made by combining isopropyl alcohol and water (normally 70% alcohol to 30% water). This is used for medical purposes (for external use only!). The water will lessen the amount of heat generated, but it will still work fine with the Trangia burner. (Avoid using the 'Wintergreen' version; this has added mint aromatics — this will still burn, but smells like $#%! Trust me on this, I've been there!)

Grain alcohol, (pure ethanol), food grade alcohol made mostly from corn. Less likely to be readily available.

Booze, over-proof rum for instance would work also, but: it's expensive and it's a darn waste!
 
Hey Guys...

Guitar...


guitardemon said:
So i just built one of these neat little stoves and i was wondering how important it is to tape it together when your done. ?
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It is an important step,, because keep in mind this is a self pressurized system...

If you don't tape or seal the joints,, it will probably leak around the seam,, especially if you have wrinkes in the aluminum..

When you fire up this little beauty,, you spill a little over the edge,,to preheat the stove....

The heat vaporized the alcohol inside which makes it a pressurized system...

ttyle

Eric
O/ST
 
I used JB weld for my stove, which works well but smells awful the first 8-10 times you run it. For the holes I used a medium sized sewing machine needle held by needle nose pliers and a tack hammer. My holes are tiny, and if I remember right I have 16 of them. The stove looks like a standard gas range burner on medium when the alc stove is going full bore. The only time I timed it was in CO once at 6500'. It seems like it boiled 2 cups in 61/2 mins, and would run for just over 9 min with the amount of fuel I put in it. I only used it on one very windy trip, and had so much trouble with it I went to other things.
 
guitardemon said:
So i just built one of these neat little stoves and i was wondering how important it is to tape it together when your done.
Click to expand...

It actually depends on your construction method.
If you get a tight tolerance fit between upper and lower can, it's not necessary.
I roll the lip of the bottom piece inward, and top piece outward, just a little bit, to allow the top to clear the top edge of the bottom piece. After that I "press" them together, there are no leaks.

The way I roll the lip is with a phillips screwdriver. Turn the top can sideways, so that about 1/4" is lying off the side of the workbench.
Roll the can along the edge, and at the same time apply pressure to the lip that is hanging off (and even spin the screwdriver shaft) so that it "flares" the top edge.

Next take the top piece. This is a little trickier. I use a street hockey ball, jaw of a vice, or something that is fairly hard. Press the inner wall of the bottom peice onto the object, then roll the phillips screwdriver along the outside of the edge, pressing inward. Several times around and you should have enough of an inward taper to allow the top can to slide over top of the bottom can. It doesn't take much.

As you are pressing them together you can feel the "seal". The pressure built up inside is a fraction of 1 single psi , so , as long as you don't have gaping holes, it should be fine.

The better stoves I have seen use no JB weld, nor aluminum tape.
 
Hey Skunk...

Yaa thats a nice method for sure..
Having not to rely on any silicone or tape is the way to go for sure..

I always seem to get a frigging wrinkle in mine and can't get the two pices together without f-ing something up..

Keep in mind these ones I've made have been slapped together..

For me it's been How Fast Can I Make One,, instead of how nice it looks..

I'm seriously thinking about doing this with scouts one night, however I'm going to have to think about it a little more...

The last time I did something with fire and Scouts,, one of them burned his locker down a school!! no kidding!!

ttyle

Eric
O/ST
 
Normark said:
Hey Skunk...

Yaa thats a nice method for sure..
Having not to rely on any silicone or tape is the way to go for sure..

I always seem to get a frigging wrinkle in mine and can't get the two pices together without f-ing something up..

Keep in mind these ones I've made have been slapped together..

For me it's been How Fast Can I Make One,, instead of how nice it looks..

I'm seriously thinking about doing this with scouts one night, however I'm going to have to think about it a little more...

The last time I did something with fire and Scouts,, one of them burned his locker down a school!! no kidding!!

ttyle

Eric
O/ST
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I made one last night, using this method, took roughly 15 minutes?
Could probably do it in 10 mins if racing.

I think if we took the time to build a cutting jig, an exacto blade would slice the cans, and also create a taper edge, like what happens when cutting copper tubing with a tubing cutter.

You can also put the bottom piece in a freezer, and the top piece in a toaster oven. Top will expand, bottom will contract, then slide them together. Poorman's way for getting a Zero- tolerance fit, we used that method when rebuilding 2 stroke motors for dirt bikes.

But, for the sake of expediency, and to get a tight fit, try this.....

Take the bottom piece and a pair of needle-nose pliers.
grip only about 1/4" of the top edge, and twist. Do this in about 6 to 8 places, equally spaced, on the edge of the bottom piece. This should reduce the diameter enough to pop the top peice on. May take a little fidgeting and pressing IN, at certain spots, with your thumbs, but, the Top piece should finally clear Bottom edge, then press it on.
When pressing equal pressure is needed so as not to create a Kink. A small piece of 2x4 helps.

Hope that all makes sense.
 
Everclear is good if you can afford it (or you can buy it in your sate). Denatured alcohol from the hardware store burns hot, but it usually has a fair percentage of methanol, so watch the fumes and getting it on your skin. Isopropyl/rubbing alcohol is a waste of time.

If you use it in the cold, it needs a little insulation underneath. Trangia sells a plastic disc gizmo for that purose that doubles as a screen to drain pasta, etc. You can warm the stove up faster by using a pan (tin foil, etc) under it and light a little puddle of alcohol to get it all going.
 
Hey Skunk....

Yaa I do make those kinks into mine as well..something like an air duct fitting is what it looks like when I'm done...

Still get frigging kinks sometime....

I'm just going to have to keep playing with it I guess...

I basically use EMT shears to cut the cans apart...

Thanks

Eric
O/ST
 
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