- Joined
- May 22, 2009
- Messages
- 1,755
Hi folks, its been a while since i've had time or inclination to practice any bushcraft stuff. But with the coming of spring I am feeling the urge again.
Today I went out and tried a couple things.
Sorry no picks to break the monotony of text, I'm not sure where my camera got to.
I had a can of sterno, i asked about it a few threads below, well you folks were right, it wouldn't boil water. It seemed like it was putting out a good amount of heat, but just didn't get anywhere.
So I decided to make a stick stove out of a gallon size coffee can.
I started by cutting a set of vent holes around the bottom using the can opener on my leatherman juice.
The can opener failed! :grumpy: Not catastrophically, but it overextend. It slipped to the side of it's back-spring. Seems like the rivet isn't quite tight enough to keep the parts inline?
So a Mora 511 took over, batoning it in lightly point first to make the cuts. Which messed up the edge a bit more than i expected.
(I wondered if my RC-3 would hold up better, but shied from abusing what is for me a very pricy knife.)
I think I'll have to slip a small diamond stone into my woods kit, I have a ceramic one in there, which is fine for touchups, but can't easily handle dings in the edge.
Anyway...
With 8 approximately thumb size holes around the bottom i kindled a fire with twigs.
(Here i found a use for the sterno, i dipped the first few twigs in it and lit them with my fire steel)
It burned but was rather smokey. All the same it boiled the water in my bottle and I made some tea.
When the can was cool i went back to work and doubled the number of vent holes.
The Second fire was much less smokey, got going very fast, and boiled up my water in about 5 minutes. Little more than ash remained when it went out.
These simple little stoves are very efficient...now i just need to make one small enough to fit comfortably in my pack.
Today I went out and tried a couple things.
Sorry no picks to break the monotony of text, I'm not sure where my camera got to.
I had a can of sterno, i asked about it a few threads below, well you folks were right, it wouldn't boil water. It seemed like it was putting out a good amount of heat, but just didn't get anywhere.
So I decided to make a stick stove out of a gallon size coffee can.
I started by cutting a set of vent holes around the bottom using the can opener on my leatherman juice.
The can opener failed! :grumpy: Not catastrophically, but it overextend. It slipped to the side of it's back-spring. Seems like the rivet isn't quite tight enough to keep the parts inline?
So a Mora 511 took over, batoning it in lightly point first to make the cuts. Which messed up the edge a bit more than i expected.
(I wondered if my RC-3 would hold up better, but shied from abusing what is for me a very pricy knife.)
I think I'll have to slip a small diamond stone into my woods kit, I have a ceramic one in there, which is fine for touchups, but can't easily handle dings in the edge.
Anyway...
With 8 approximately thumb size holes around the bottom i kindled a fire with twigs.
(Here i found a use for the sterno, i dipped the first few twigs in it and lit them with my fire steel)
It burned but was rather smokey. All the same it boiled the water in my bottle and I made some tea.
When the can was cool i went back to work and doubled the number of vent holes.
The Second fire was much less smokey, got going very fast, and boiled up my water in about 5 minutes. Little more than ash remained when it went out.
These simple little stoves are very efficient...now i just need to make one small enough to fit comfortably in my pack.
