Shut UpJoined: 03 Aug 2014Posts: 566Location: Beacon Hill
I don't have bike camping compatible camp stove so I'm in the market to buy one. I'm thinking of going down the JetBoil route, but I figured I'd check with the professionals here first.
What stove do you use? Why do you like it?
Chip McShoulder
Posted: Sun May 03, 2015 9:38 am
dog licking ice cream coneJoined: 11 Aug 2008Posts: 3022Location: Rainbow Road
Do you have any extreme requirements, like multifuel etc? Lacking more specific demands get one of these chinese canister stoves for under $10. I bought one to try out a year so back. Works about the same as any of the other ones out there.
Ive have/had an MSR Whisperlite International & Brunton Vapor AF for burning anything when in foreign lands etc. 90% of the time I take out snow peak canister stove for the weekend. If I was in your position, Id get that chinese job and a canister from rei for $10 out the door.
axel
Posted: Sun May 03, 2015 6:14 pm
Joined: 15 Feb 2013Posts: 1654Location: St Johns PDX
+1 for the MSR Superfly. I've had mine for over 3 years and it's been solid, no complaints.
JetBoil stoves have always seemed to be overkill for bike camping to me.
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joeball
Posted: Mon May 04, 2015 8:41 am
Joined: 24 Jul 2005Posts: 6037Location: Ether
I have a jetboil pcs (solo) and like that it is a well integrated system. Boils fast, on/off is easy. The pot and stove connect via bayonet lugs. Packs into itself with no wasted space or sharp edges.
That said, I have taken it out less and less for bike camping. It is about the size of a 2L nalgene. I have opted for not cooking or bringing the gsi minimalist mug with a small canister and the $10 Amazon stove.
The $10 stove is nice for the price but I modded mine a little.
Last weekend a friend showed me another chinese stove that looked very nice. It was the "fire maple" brand on Amazon. They have a few different ones.
derrickito
Posted: Mon May 04, 2015 9:16 am
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minimalist DIYer: go alcohol. but that will get tiring fast. they are super lightweight, but i got sick of having to waste fuel, no on/off switch, hard to refill if you didn't pour enough, etc.
car camping? fuck it, load up the propane double burner
whisperlites are incredibly great if in weird places with oddball fuels, but bulky.
i too have ended up with my tiny chinese style screw on top of canister stove as my usual go to if in an area without fires. that's with me more than anything these days
my second favorite? it's one of those tri fold collapsible wood fired fuel stoves. similar to this: http://www.cleardomesolar.com/img/Collapsible_pelletckr-tri-sml.jpg . it burns whatever you find handy (grass / sticks / etc. you don't have to carry any fuel with you. and i've never been to a place where i can't find fuel for it. takes a little more time but i love that thing. not for everyone though. it drives my wife insane because she just wants to turn something on to make coffee
first favorite: just put your fucking pot on the camp fire.
_____
tldr: get a chinese cheapo. it's the tried and tested best of lightweight and easy for most light short camp trips.
Andrew_Squirrel
Posted: Mon May 04, 2015 9:36 am
Joined: 01 Mar 2010Posts: 2098Location: Greenwood
If you're planning any upcoming bike tours with a big group using a big pot that actually needs to simmer food instead of boil water rapidly I would highly suggest the MSR Dragonfly, we had great great luck with this on a 14 day ride with 6 cyclists:
I've been using my MSR Whisperlite for years (boy scouts) and even though it is bulky and weird shaped I still love the control over how much fuel you have. You can easily measure how much you need per meal and only bring that amount + a little extra.
I'll probably eventually get a compact canister stove but I'm still turned off by the concept of not knowing how much fuel in in the canister when you head out. I've heard many people say they have a pile of canisters in their basement with 10-25% left, not confident enough to even bring them on an overnight. Of course you could always bring an extra canister but then you are bumping yourself back into the bulky stove category.
Like all gear there are +/- to each system and its best to figure out what your typical food situation will be then decide from there. If you're going space food every trip then a compact and fast stove is your obvious choice.
dog licking ice cream coneJoined: 11 Aug 2008Posts: 3022Location: Rainbow Road
I've never had a problem shaking the canister and figuring out, within at most 25%, how much fuel is left. The newer ones have floats, I think, but even in their absence, you can easily tell the difference between a full canister, a half-full one, and one that's almost dead.
I bring the 10-25% ones car camping, and use them as a third, not-a-big-deal-when-it-dies burner alongside the coleman. (then you can still make coffee while you've got a bacon griddle over both burners of the coleman or whatever)
Joined: 06 Dec 2010Posts: 1235537Location: a hammy melange...
IMHO, Jetboil stoves are great if everything you cook requires boiling water, because I have never found a stove that boils water faster than a jetboil. And apparently that's all it does, because we could never get the damn thing to not be full jet blast when powered on.
Last summer, a couple buddies and I all brought our stoves up to Thornton Lakes. I had an MSR Whisperlite alchohol stove, another friend had a JetBoil, and a third guy had a Solo wood-powered stove.
The Jetboil is great at one thing - heating up water very quickly, and in a fixed quantity. If you like eating soups all the time, the Jetboil is the one you want.
The MSR Whisperlite is a great little stove that puts out the same heat as the Jetboil when on full blast, but you get the added perk of being able to turn the heat down a bit and put something on the burner that isn't a form-fitting cup. Otherwise it can be a bit of a bear to set up on uneven surfaces and to keep stuff from falling off of the burner, etc.
The Solo was our favorite general stove. At least for this particular wood stove, getting good heat and maintaining it was relatively easy to do, and we had the added perk of having a small campfire in the evenings, despite the no-fires ban in the national parks at the time (the ranger said that wood stoves are exempt from the rule). It does take longer to get water up to a boil with the Solo, and you do need to continually feed wood into it, but the benefit is that once you have a solid ember pile inside it keeps its heat consistently for a good time, and hey, you don't have to pack any fuel at all either.
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justgarth
Posted: Mon May 04, 2015 10:46 am
Joined: 04 Apr 2011Posts: 802
I can't speak towards other stoves, but just anecdotally--I've been using my whisperlite since around 2001, and have never had to do any maintenance on it besides shaking it every so often. (Which is its recommended cleaning procedure, fwiw.) It works as good as new, if a bit scuffed up.
Dan
Posted: Tue May 05, 2015 9:05 pm
Shut UpJoined: 03 Aug 2014Posts: 566Location: Beacon Hill
Thanks everyone. I went with the cheepo amazon option.
I've been using my MSR Whisperlite for years (boy scouts) and even though it is bulky and weird shaped I still love the control over how much fuel you have. You can easily measure how much you need per meal and only bring that amount + a little extra.
I'll probably eventually get a compact canister stove but I'm still turned off by the concept of not knowing how much fuel in in the canister when you head out.
The other nice thing about liquid fuels is that you can resupply en route. Finding petrol or kerosene is easier than finding food.
For the canister stoves I weigh them on a kitchen scale after each trip. Recording the weight in sharpie on the bottom provides a nice log and current estimate of the remaining fuel.
jimmythefly
Posted: Wed May 06, 2015 7:11 am
Joined: 10 Jan 2007Posts: 1491
Does anyone have one of those little wood-fired stoves they will bring to BC or that I could borrow? Interested in trying one out before buying.
wang
Posted: Wed May 06, 2015 8:17 am
Joined: 25 Jan 2012Posts: 884
Does anyone have thoughts on Esbit tablets as a heat source?
derrickito
Posted: Wed May 06, 2015 9:18 am
now with 50 percent more EVILJoined: 22 Jul 2005Posts: 10566
jimmythefly wrote:
Does anyone have one of those little wood-fired stoves they will bring to BC or that I could borrow? Interested in trying one out before buying.
jimmy, i have one. not hauling it to ben country, but you can borrow it whenever you want. dependent on me finding it of course. it's flat and hides easily and i'm currently unorganized. i'll try and get eyes on it
jimmythefly
Posted: Wed May 06, 2015 10:25 am
Joined: 10 Jan 2007Posts: 1491
No rush Derrick. If you see it while rummaging for somethign else grab it but otherwise no need to make a big effort. For BC I might just do cold/campfire-heated food anyway.
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Shut Up
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