Tuesday, September 2, 2008

Light my fire


The good man Jaas writes:
I just bought an Optimus Hunter stove. Do you have any experience with this one? And what's this shit with wind screens flying every which direction?

Jaas,
I do indeed have some experience with the Optimus Hunter. Once I had to take it apart in the field, and apply seal oil, brought along as a nutritional supplement for the dogs, on the gaskets. And it worked! I could not have been more proud if I had conjured up nuclear fission with a q-tip and some spruce bark.
Why the stove producers fail to take the wind factor into account is one of the big mysteries of western civilization. There is, however, an entire subculture of twig heads who craft their own camp stoves. I have considered making a rocket stove, (though a more portable one than the one pictured in this link), could be a cool way to heat dog feed.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

I have continued my research for a good stove solution without having too worry about loosing the windscreen if the wind blows and with more heat efficiency. There are a couple of interesting commercial products out on the market. Primus Etapower MF (multifuel and gas) and Jetboil Helios (gas) seems too have good solutions for heat efficiency and wind. And the old Trangia "storm kitchen" with a multifuel burner seems like a good solution.

Rune Gjeldnes writes about a polar kitchen made by Willy Gautvik on his homepage; http://www.rune-gjeldnes.com/News.aspx. This stove is no longer possible buy, but i heard it is really good.