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Bike Packing Camp Stoves

Old 03-15-19, 11:14 PM
  #126  
Lovegasoline
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Originally Posted by greatscott
At the time I bought the one I showed, all the cheaper ones I got terrible reviews which is why I didn't buy one that was cheaper. The Titanium one that I just saw on Amazon doesn't have a pezel starter and it costs $3 more then mine which isn't a big deal more.

I haven't had any issues with my stove, BTU output is the same as a friends MSR system, we both boiled water with a few seconds of each other in the same size container, the output is supposedly 6.666 BTUs; I don't have nothing to weigh my stove with but it's light and very small; works in cold weather (but I haven't been touring and cooking at below 45 degrees yet but it worked fine for that and I don't plan on touring in freezing temps), while raining, in the wind if I use the windscreen and high altitudes (I haven't camped at above 8,000 feet while touring, I'm not sure how high I was, somewhere between 6000 to 7500 feet); there is no reason to strip the stove because it's very basic and nothing to go wrong except for the pezel lighter could fail so you then you light it with a match or a lighter, or a magnesium spark if that were to happen. I happened to find this review today on my stove: https://www.outdoorgearlab.com/revie...ity-ultralight It has some negatives but those negatives won't effect me due to I don't camp in those conditions.
Hi greatscott,
Please don't misunderstand me I'm not dissing your stove ...if your gear choices work for you than all's good : )

My post was simply a follow up to the idea that "you can tour on a budget if you want".
Within that paradigm any opportunity to reduce an expense by 50% can be beneficial. If all expenses can be reduced by 50% (or more), even better.

Originally Posted by greatscott
When it's windy I pull this out: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...?ie=UTF8&psc=1 cheap only $10 and it works great.
Just a head's up, many canister stove manufacturers warn against using a windscreen as it can result in an explosion. Take care when using it. YMMV.
An aside: once I was walking back to my campsite when I heard a massively loud explosion. An isobutane-propane cartridge exploded ... shrapnel blew holes in the surrounding camp chairs. Very interesting drama!

Another way to start a fire with a battery, in this case a AA:
Go to about 1:35 in the video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SL6X_WiLiEA

PS: I didn't buy my $7 stove from Amazon but from another internet vendor - Monoprice - better known for inexpensive computer cables and accessories. I never even imagined they sold camping gear. Apparently they're not currently selling the stove I bought. It's also pretty light @1.8oz if that sort of thing matters. Nowadays inexpensive stoves abound.


Sawyer Mini Water Filter:
Originally Posted by cyccommute
Nope. Not a bad one. It’s a problem that hollow fiber filters have. Google “Sawyer filter failure” and you’ll find all kind of stories about failures. They are all along the lines of mine...worked fine, perhaps stored, and then didn’t work or only had a trickle. And I’ve found lots of ideas on how to bring the filter back but if the filter suddenly stops working in nowhere and you don’t have access to the stuff you need for those fixes, they are useless as is the filter.
I've never used one before however I bought one new on ebay a couple months ago ($10) to fit into an ultralight backpacking kit (and maybe bring along bike touring). There seems to be a lot of advice on backflushing, avoiding storage in freezing temps (i.e. bring into sleeping bag if it's cold), and perhaps a makeshift silt prefilter. Like a lot of stuff there's people that swear at them and those that swear by them.
--

Quite the trip down memory lane with all those Bleuet stoves and blue canisters.

Last edited by Lovegasoline; 03-16-19 at 01:44 PM.
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Old 03-16-19, 08:39 AM
  #127  
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Originally Posted by Lovegasoline
Sawyer Mini Water Filter:


I've never used one before however I bought one new on ebay a couple months ago ($10) to fit into an ultralight backpacking kit (and maybe bring along bike touring). There seems to be a lot of advice on backflushing, avoiding storage in freezing temps (i.e. bring into sleeping bag if it's cold), and perhaps a makeshift silt prefilter. Like a lot of stuff there's people that swear at them and those that swear by them.
I’ve heard it all before. Just to be clear, I filtered about a liter of water through the filter. The water source was from a stream at 11,800 feet surrounded by 13,000 to 14,000 foot granitic peaks. In a drop of only about 2000 feet while flowing over granite, there isn’t much dissolved in the water nor is there even much sediment. The stream I filtered from was clear and there wasn’t even a sand bar where it flowed into the lake. I then took the filter home and let it dry so that it wouldn’t mildew. It was never frozen and never used again until about a year later when I took the dried filter with me on a bikepacking trip.

The water I filtered was clear and free of sediment. I filled the squeeze bag and tried to filter the water. A trickle came out. I squeezed for about an hour and got about a cup of water out of the filter. I was able to get about a liter more by placing a rock on the bag and letting it drip into a tea pot. As I wasn’t expecting the filter to not work nor even expecting to have a problem, I wasn’t carrying vinegar (suggestions for getting it to flow again) nor the backflushing system (I didn’t have water to back flush with anyway). As I was expecting to have a filter that worked, I didn’t have other purification methods other then boiling. But boiling and cooling of enough water for use is kind difficult if you only have a tea pot that will functionally only hold about 800 ml of water and you need about 3 liters of water. I made due but that’s more fuel than I wanted to use.

Compare that with the Sweetwater filter I’ve used before. I’ve filtered gallons of water with it and never had an issue with any aspect of using it. It has never plugged. It has never reduced flow. It has never failed in any way. Yes, it’s a bit heavier but it’s a whole lot lighter than something that doesn’t work.

Finally, just to be clear, I’ve had experience with hollow fiber filters at work. We use them on deionization systems at my work. Since my incident with the Sawyer, I’ve had some experience with dried out filters that do exactly what the Sawyer did. Once dry...especially here in dry Colorado...the hollow fiber won’t rehydrate and flow is reduced or nonexistent.
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Old 03-16-19, 09:44 AM
  #128  
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Quite the trip down memory lane with all those Bleuet stoves and blue canisters.
A trip down memory lane in the USA. In most of the rest of the world, the Bleuet pattern remains a current camp stove system.

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Old 03-16-19, 10:01 AM
  #129  
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restrictions in size of bike packing bags does make a tiny stove really important..
Sure you cannot get along without cooking ?







...

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Old 03-16-19, 05:04 PM
  #130  
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It had been a couple of years since I'd taken the pulse of camp stoves and this thread got me surfing the 'net.

I cycle tour rather than bike pack (or through hike, an activity that seems to drive a lot of the lightweight camping market) and I daily visit at least one small village with some sort of store where I can buy the common foodstuffs of the locals. I see Jetboil et al is trying to do more these days than just super efficiently boil water to rehydrate packaged meals. Hmm: Jetcook?

For the last seven years or so I've thought the Biolite wood burner was simultaneously cool and ridiculous. If it works for you I'm happy, but most of the campgrounds I bivouac in seem to be either gleaned or have prohibitions on foraging combustibles. 2019 and not to worry: Biolite now offers pre-packaged bags of clean, dry 'twigs'.


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Old 03-16-19, 06:42 PM
  #131  
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Originally Posted by cyccommute


Nope. Not a bad one. It’s a problem that hollow fiber filters have. Google “Sawyer filter failure” and you’ll find all kind of stories about failures. They are all along the lines of mine...worked fine, perhaps stored, and then didn’t work or only had a trickle. And I’ve found lots of ideas on how to bring the filter back but if the filter suddenly stops working in nowhere and you don’t have access to the stuff you need for those fixes, they are useless as is the filter.

I have several of those (or something similar). They suffer from the same problem as stoves. At altitude, they don’t work. And, if they don’t work, they are less than useless. They are even dangerous since you might depend on them.

So far I've had no issues with the Sawyer, but remember too that the Sawyer Mini filter (the one I have) FAR outsells any other filtering system probably due to price, so there will be more reports of problems. If I run into a problem and I think it's something worth considering a different brand then I will, but these things have been throughly tested without issues, and all the reviews highly praise the Sawyer Mini. The only other filter on the market that I would remotely consider and it gets rave reviews, and is small enough to hike or bike tour with, is the LifeStraw water filter but it doesn't filter down as far as the Sawyer does and the cost per liter of water is a lot higher than the Sawyer.

I know too that the Sawyer system will not filter out viruses or heavy metals, but both of those things are rare in N American backcountry. If you're going to undeveloped countries then a bit more expensive filtration system that gets rid of viruses and heavy metals will be necessary. I'm not too sure since I don't use these types, but the best two I read about is the Grayl Ultralight system, and it's reasonably priced at just $60 but it will only do 150 liters; or the Aquamira Frontier Bottle filtration system that cost $50 and has a 450 liter capacity, but that one doesn't filter out the bacteria as well as the Grayl. But I don't need these better ones for where I go.

Years ago I use to have something similar to the MSR Sweetwater device you use, can't recall the brand any more, but it's a large device similar to the MSR and I didn't find it very ideal to go touring with due to size and weight, but no doubt it worked good which I'm sure the MSR does as well. But I googled MSR problems and found problems with them too; in addition to that they are mechanical, and a mechanical system will fail a lot faster than a non mechanical system like the Sawyer. So do you want mechanical failure, do you want larger space and weight in your backpack or panniers? Not for me anyways.

So in reality if my Sawyer ever fails I would simply buy another considering the options that are out there at this time.

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Old 03-17-19, 07:37 PM
  #132  
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Originally Posted by chrisx
How fine of a grind is it? If I grind beans at the super market, I use the finest setting.

Is there a coffee thread for the touring cyclist, or does it just fit in with camp stoves?
It has an adjustable grind. I always use the the most coarse setting, so I'm not sure exactly how fine it gets.
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Old 03-19-19, 08:38 PM
  #133  
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First off you never...NEVER...pregrind coffee, ground coffee is only good for 30 minutes! after that it begins to go bad! So what do you do when you go camping? One thing you can do is grind it anyway and not worry about the coffee going bad and put it in zip lock baggie and take as much air out of the bag as possible; or buy a small grinder like the Porlex Mini that I have which is very small and suitable for backpacking, or in my case bike touring.
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Old 03-19-19, 09:23 PM
  #134  
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Originally Posted by greatscott
First off you never...NEVER...pregrind coffee, ground coffee is only good for 30 minutes! after that it begins to go bad! So what do you do when you go camping? One thing you can do is grind it anyway and not worry about the coffee going bad and put it in zip lock baggie and take as much air out of the bag as possible; or buy a small grinder like the Porlex Mini that I have which is very small and suitable for backpacking, or in my case bike touring.
How does it go “bad”? Especially in 30 minutes. There is a lot...a lot...of bad information out there on the interwebz about coffee that simply isn’t true. Nothing isn’t coffee is reactive enough to go “bad” in 30 minutes. The acids won’t oxidize in that amount of time, the organics won’t evaporate in the at amount of time nor will they oxidize.
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Old 03-20-19, 12:05 AM
  #135  
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My jar of instant is like.. six months old and it still tastes good.
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Old 03-20-19, 06:59 PM
  #136  
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Originally Posted by cyccommute


I’ve heard it all before. Just to be clear, I filtered about a liter of water through the filter. The water source was from a stream at 11,800 feet surrounded by 13,000 to 14,000 foot granitic peaks. In a drop of only about 2000 feet while flowing over granite, there isn’t much dissolved in the water nor is there even much sediment. The stream I filtered from was clear and there wasn’t even a sand bar where it flowed into the lake. I then took the filter home and let it dry so that it wouldn’t mildew. It was never frozen and never used again until about a year later when I took the dried filter with me on a bikepacking trip.

The water I filtered was clear and free of sediment. I filled the squeeze bag and tried to filter the water. A trickle came out. I squeezed for about an hour and got about a cup of water out of the filter. I was able to get about a liter more by placing a rock on the bag and letting it drip into a tea pot. As I wasn’t expecting the filter to not work nor even expecting to have a problem, I wasn’t carrying vinegar (suggestions for getting it to flow again) nor the backflushing system (I didn’t have water to back flush with anyway). As I was expecting to have a filter that worked, I didn’t have other purification methods other then boiling. But boiling and cooling of enough water for use is kind difficult if you only have a tea pot that will functionally only hold about 800 ml of water and you need about 3 liters of water. I made due but that’s more fuel than I wanted to use.

Compare that with the Sweetwater filter I’ve used before. I’ve filtered gallons of water with it and never had an issue with any aspect of using it. It has never plugged. It has never reduced flow. It has never failed in any way. Yes, it’s a bit heavier but it’s a whole lot lighter than something that doesn’t work.

Finally, just to be clear, I’ve had experience with hollow fiber filters at work. We use them on deionization systems at my work. Since my incident with the Sawyer, I’ve had some experience with dried out filters that do exactly what the Sawyer did. Once dry...especially here in dry Colorado...the hollow fiber won’t rehydrate and flow is reduced or nonexistent.
I have had this happen to me with a brand new Sawyer Mini backpacking on the JMT a few years ago. A few nights later we met someone with a pump style filter and back flushed the Mini with that. It did not take much back flushing and the Mini started working and it worked fine the rest of the trip. It did take some pressure to free it though. In this situation I was with a group and there were other filters. Also had chemicals for backup.
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Old 03-20-19, 08:56 PM
  #137  
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Originally Posted by cyccommute


How does it go “bad”? Especially in 30 minutes. There is a lot...a lot...of bad information out there on the interwebz about coffee that simply isn’t true. Nothing isn’t coffee is reactive enough to go “bad” in 30 minutes. The acids won’t oxidize in that amount of time, the organics won’t evaporate in the at amount of time nor will they oxidize.
LOL! Not really sure! that's what i've been told for many years. Of course if ground coffee is vacuum sealed or kept frozen it's fine for a very long time, but supposedly you can actually shorten whole coffee bean life by refrigeration. Also when I say go bad, it doesn't mean it's not drinkable, it just means the flavor won't be at it's peak. https://www.doesitgobad.com/does-ground-coffee-go-bad/ Anywhere I look on the internet, or in books all say the same thing, so I can't imagine why that wouldn't be true. https://www.hilinecoffee.com/blog/does-coffee-go-bad/ https://www.canitgobad.net/can-ground-coffee-go-bad/

You can use instant coffee camping, I know a lot of people who buy those instant Starbucks packs, but I don't like that stuff, so usually I will grind my coffee up the morning I'm leaving to go touring and put into a ziplock bag, and it will be good till I run out and need to buy some more then I use my mini grinder when I get back to camp and grind it and store it in the same ziplock bag.
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Old 03-21-19, 07:11 AM
  #138  
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For stoves with gas canisters, what impact will altitude have on cook time or number of uses?

For example, if a small (110 gram?) can of fuel gives 20 uses at 1000 ft altitude, how many uses will I get at 10,000 ft? Half that? One third?

I've asked locally but can't get anyone to be specific. "Burn through it a lot faster" and similar is all I hear.

I understand that "It depends" and so forth, but can anyone with experience throw out a rough number? Will I need twice as much fuel? Ten times as much?


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Old 03-21-19, 09:56 AM
  #139  
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Originally Posted by TimothyH
For stoves with gas canisters, what impact will altitude have on cook time or number of uses?

For example, if a small (110 gram?) can of fuel gives 20 uses at 1000 ft altitude, how many uses will I get at 10,000 ft? Half that? One third?

...
X number of grams of fuel will give you roughly the same amount of BTUs regardless of altitude. I say roughly because a slight change in air to fuel ratio can result in slightly different products of combustion. Example, if you are running richer you will be producing more CO and less CO2 which means fewer BTUs, etc.

Higher altitude means lower boiling temperature, so less fuel needed at high altitude if starting point was the same temperature because you needed to heat the water less.

All that said, just a slight difference in wind, or a change in the diameter of the pot, or if the pot had a blackened base, etc., will likely be a bigger factor than just a change in elevation. Also, higher elevation usually means cooler temperatures, thus a lower starting point for your water and a cooler cannister.

I am not sure if all butane mix type cannisters are the same mix of compounds, but different compounds will have a slightly different BTU per gram figure too. But I consider all of the cannister brands to be comparable as far as heating ability.

In other words, roughly the same but expect a wide tolerance.
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Old 03-21-19, 01:52 PM
  #140  
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Like I said before I don't think the Sawyer has any more trouble then any other brand, I think that Sawyer far outsells all other brands so the number of complaints will be more, for example, if MSR sells a 1000 of their filter units and they get 10 complaints it doesn't sound like that many, but is Sawyer sells 100,000 units and they get a 1000 complaints that sounds like a lot more but percentage wise its the same. The MSR Guardian, or the Miniworks, and others like this, have more mechanical parts which means a larger chance for something to break then the simple non mechanical Sawyer, not saying that the MSR is junk, just saying there is more opportunity for something to break or fail; and addition the MSR Guardian is quite a bit larger which is something I don't want. But after reading reviews I discovered that the Sawyer got 4 stars and the MSR got 4 1/2 stars, some reviews the Sawyer got 4 1/2 stars, and in others it got 5 stars, while the MSR got 4 1/2 stars on some reviews and 5 stars on others, so in a nut shell the Sawyer on a couple of reviews lost only a 1/2 a star over the MSR and was tied with the MSR on all the other reviews, not bad considering the cost difference.

The Etekcity stove does not have any warning about not using a windscreen with their unit, in fact they make their own windscreen which you can buy as an option. The only reason why some stove manufactures won't recommend using a windscreen is because their seals they use between the stove and canister are poor quality and won't last long thus they don't want something blowing up, better quality stoves will always recommend windscreens for windy days. I'm sure the MSR is a great unit, but I also don't want to be using a match to light it everytime when the Etekcity, and others, have pezel starters that don't require a battery to run, I think to charge as much as MSR does without using a pezel start just seems backwards to me.

I never took measurements in either grams used or time used to tell anyone if there is a greater or lessor usage of fuel at elevation, and nor will I be doing that-it's too much work for me!

Not all fuel uses the same fuel mixture, there are some mixtures that are better for colder weather: https://www.msrgear.com/blog/ins-outs-canister-fuels/ if you read that you will see that certain types of fuel will work better at certain temps than others, so keeping that in mind look at this site for the blends: https://adventuresinstoving.blogspot...-for-cold.html From here you can see which fuel is better for colder climates So one could say that MSR fuel works better in the cold, yes it does, but if you don't camp in the cold then do you care? I know I don't.
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Old 03-21-19, 08:16 PM
  #141  
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Originally Posted by greatscott
The Etekcity stove does not have any warning about not using a windscreen with their unit, in fact they make their own windscreen which you can buy as an option. The only reason why some stove manufactures won't recommend using a windscreen is because their seals they use between the stove and canister are poor quality and won't last long thus they don't want something blowing up, better quality stoves will always recommend windscreens for windy days.
I suppose a distinction should be made regarding a windshield vs. windscreen. Maybe these terms are not universal nomenclature accepted by the stove industry?

As for standalone items, I'm using 'windshield' to refer to something that functions like as a wind break (for example setting the stove behind a rock that protects it from being in the direct stream of the wind) and that could include a product that protects the flame without fully enclosing the stove.

I'm using 'windscreen' to mean a full surrounding enclosure. As an example, the MSR Whisperlight comes with a thin aluminum sheet which can be bent into a circle to surround the stove and with a place for the fuel line to enter. It also comes with an aluminum disk to place on the ground/substrate underneath the stove to reflect the heat back upwards towards the pot. However in this arrangement because of the protected fuel line, the fuel bottle is placed remotely - outside the windscreen - so the windscreen besides protecting the flame from the wind to increase the BTUs might actually also function to provide an additional layer of safety by creating a barrier to further shield the fuel bottle from the heat source.

On a canister stove if you completely surrounded the stove with a windscreen such as described above and then placed a pot on it, is it a possibly that the enclosing windscreen could heat up the gas canister beyond a safe temperature? This is what I always assumed to be the reasoning for the warning.
Some canister stoves have a little built-in windscreen which also deflects heat upwards and away from the gas canister ... but these aren't the super tiny gram saver micro stoves.

----

Originally Posted by robmcl
I have had this happen to me with a brand new Sawyer Mini backpacking on the JMT a few years ago. A few nights later we met someone with a pump style filter and back flushed the Mini with that. It did not take much back flushing and the Mini started working and it worked fine the rest of the trip. It did take some pressure to free it though. In this situation I was with a group and there were other filters. Also had chemicals for backup.
I'm curious, did you pack the little flushing syringe that comes with the Sawyer Mini and try to use it to back flush the filter? Again, I own one but have never used it. [Like you I think it's a good idea to have an emergency backup, and generally some very lightweight chemical water treatment (tablets, liquid) in my pack. Boiling would be second backup. As a last resort I'd just drink the water untreated and take my chances ... which I'll sometimes do anyway even if I have water treatment stuff, depending on the water source.

PS: Sweetwater pump water filter ... I had one of the (original?) ones from the late 80's before MSR bought the product but I haven't used it in ages. Who knows, I might even still have it stored somewhere.

Last edited by Lovegasoline; 03-21-19 at 09:35 PM.
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Old 03-21-19, 08:35 PM
  #142  
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The thing I have that serves as a windscreen or shield folds flat and when unfolded surrounds the stove completely along the sides, not the top.

I was thinking that if one blew up maybe a kevlar vest should be used.
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Old 03-21-19, 08:40 PM
  #143  
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^
The pot (depending on it's diameter) could seal off the top retaining a great deal of heat. If the windscreen surrounds the stove pretty tightly ... depending on the conditions .. the set up might also reflect a great deal of heat back down onto the now almost fully enclosed gas canister?

The fine print on my MSR ISOPRO fuel canister states"Do not enclose the canister with any windscreen" and "Do not expose to heat or store at temperatures above 120ºF (49ºC)."

Maybe you could keep one side of the windscreen open for ventilation and/or not wrap it too tightly around the canister ... to function more like a windshield.

The kevlar vest would likely help but it will not protect your face from the shrapnel.
I'd hate to have my face and chest a foot and half from the stove when the gas canister cooks off.
I don't think these canisters have any sort of relief valve that opens when the pressure increases to a dangerous level so you wouldn't get any warning: it would just explode. Tanks that have relief valves can and do explode.
As I wrote upthread I've seen the aftermath of a canister cooking off and heard the explosion. I was very impressed and I've seen a my fair share of explosions and grease bombs.

Stay safe.

Last edited by Lovegasoline; 03-22-19 at 02:54 PM.
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Old 03-22-19, 09:54 PM
  #144  
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My windscreen does not seal off the canister tightly with no space around it, mine has about an inch of space around the canister and that keeps the wind away just fine, plus of course I never had a canister blow. I sent Jetboil an email about this question so I have to wait for their response.
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Old 03-23-19, 06:56 AM
  #145  
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I have almost never camped in the desert and I have a lot more cold weather camping experience than hot weather camping experience. But I am still quite careful with a windscreen, only put it near a cannister if it is so windy that it is needed. But if you put a windscreen too close to a canister on a hot day with little wind, your cannister could get too warm for safety.

But in cold weather, I am more likely to put my cannister in a shallow warm water bath (warm, not hot) to try to warm it up while cooking than I am to tightly surround it with a wind screen.

Photo is a liquid fuel stove, not a cannister stove, but it does show what I typically would use for wind. The photo implies that my Ortliebs are way too close to the stove, but I assure you it was windy enough and cold enough that I had no reason to worry about any damage to my Ortliebs from heat from the stove.

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Old 03-23-19, 06:12 PM
  #146  
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This stuff about Sawyer filters is silly. People need to read the instructions, that's all.

All the problems described in this thread will be avoided if the instructions are read and followed.


-Tim-
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Old 03-23-19, 08:23 PM
  #147  
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Originally Posted by Tourist in MSN
I have almost never camped in the desert and I have a lot more cold weather camping experience than hot weather camping experience. But I am still quite careful with a windscreen, only put it near a cannister if it is so windy that it is needed. But if you put a windscreen too close to a canister on a hot day with little wind, your cannister could get too warm for safety.

But in cold weather, I am more likely to put my cannister in a shallow warm water bath (warm, not hot) to try to warm it up while cooking than I am to tightly surround it with a wind screen.

Photo is a liquid fuel stove, not a cannister stove, but it does show what I typically would use for wind. The photo implies that my Ortliebs are way too close to the stove, but I assure you it was windy enough and cold enough that I had no reason to worry about any damage to my Ortliebs from heat from the stove.

I never use the windscreen unless there's wind, which is why it's called a windscreen.
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Old 03-23-19, 08:24 PM
  #148  
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Originally Posted by TimothyH
This stuff about Sawyer filters is silly. People need to read the instructions, that's all.

All the problems described in this thread will be avoided if the instructions are read and followed.


-Tim-
hmm, maybe that's why I never had a problem with mine, could it be?
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Old 03-26-19, 06:47 PM
  #149  
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Originally Posted by TimothyH
This stuff about Sawyer filters is silly. People need to read the instructions, that's all.

All the problems described in this thread will be avoided if the instructions are read and followed.


-Tim-
Well that is start but silly is pretty strong. Water filters are delicate and can plug up pretty easy if one is not careful. If you are going into the backcountry the prudent thing is to also carry some chemicals.
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Old 03-26-19, 06:52 PM
  #150  
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Originally Posted by Lovegasoline
I suppose a distinction should be made regarding a windshield vs. windscreen. Maybe these terms are not universal nomenclature accepted by the stove industry?

As for standalone items, I'm using 'windshield' to refer to something that functions like as a wind break (for example setting the stove behind a rock that protects it from being in the direct stream of the wind) and that could include a product that protects the flame without fully enclosing the stove.

I'm using 'windscreen' to mean a full surrounding enclosure. As an example, the MSR Whisperlight comes with a thin aluminum sheet which can be bent into a circle to surround the stove and with a place for the fuel line to enter. It also comes with an aluminum disk to place on the ground/substrate underneath the stove to reflect the heat back upwards towards the pot. However in this arrangement because of the protected fuel line, the fuel bottle is placed remotely - outside the windscreen - so the windscreen besides protecting the flame from the wind to increase the BTUs might actually also function to provide an additional layer of safety by creating a barrier to further shield the fuel bottle from the heat source.

On a canister stove if you completely surrounded the stove with a windscreen such as described above and then placed a pot on it, is it a possibly that the enclosing windscreen could heat up the gas canister beyond a safe temperature? This is what I always assumed to be the reasoning for the warning.
Some canister stoves have a little built-in windscreen which also deflects heat upwards and away from the gas canister ... but these aren't the super tiny gram saver micro stoves.

----



I'm curious, did you pack the little flushing syringe that comes with the Sawyer Mini and try to use it to back flush the filter? Again, I own one but have never used it. [Like you I think it's a good idea to have an emergency backup, and generally some very lightweight chemical water treatment (tablets, liquid) in my pack. Boiling would be second backup. As a last resort I'd just drink the water untreated and take my chances ... which I'll sometimes do anyway even if I have water treatment stuff, depending on the water source.

PS: Sweetwater pump water filter ... I had one of the (original?) ones from the late 80's before MSR bought the product but I haven't used it in ages. Who knows, I might even still have it stored somewhere.
It was on a gravity filter. Backflushing with the gravity filter did not work. Not sure if a small syinge would have helped.
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