halfbiked

I used a tuna-can stove on the AT for 4 months. It worked well & certainly has a place in the lineup of options for bike camping. I would caution anyone considering a home made alcohol stove to experiment at home and on short trips before choosing one for a long trip. The nice thing about biking is that the weight of your load isn't actually riding on your body - its on the bike. Carrying an extra pound of stove isn't as big a deal when bike touring. For those that choose to go ultra-light, its a great option. But its not for everyone.

I can recommend it for those that: like futzing with their gear / making their own stuff; people that are travelling solo (or at least cooking solo); people that are counting grams in pursuit of ultra-light nirvana; people that do not plan to cook at higher altitudes or in cold weather.

mntbikedude

Those are really cool. Thanks for sharing that. We met a guy on last summers tour that had one of those. And it was great.

tourbike

Here's an interesting use for starting a fire from the bottom portion of a soda can. Presumably, one could polish the bottom of their can stove, start a mini-fire and then ignite the stove completely without an external source of fire (matches, lighters)...
https://www.trackertrail.com/survival...dchocolatebar/

abbub

Well, I finished building a 26-hole pop can stove yesterday. Fired it up and it seems to get VERY hot.

I did the 26 hole version because the only thing I had to punch holes in the can with was a thumbtack.

I'm going to fashion a pot stand and wind guard for it tonite. I have a Primus Yellowstone Techno that has served me well, but I've found that it's sometimes hard to find IsoPro in a lot of the little towns that I've biked through in the past. The PopCan stove is so small and light, I might just take both of them on my Western Express/TAT tour next month.

JoeLonghair

Trangia with a sig bottle, when I go with friends I take a bigger pot and it will cook for 5 people, as with the fuel bit its roughly 10% water to stop the soot and when I want to simmer a pasta sauce slowly for ages then i put 20% + water. Trangia also now are doing a multipurpose top, works as a sieve, a lid and a chopping board also a must for the kit. At airports, as long as you burn off the fuel in the brass stove, no smell and they will allow it on board, I think smell = vapour and quite rightly its a no no

Rogerinchrist

You are talking 90% fuel + 10% water / 80% fuel + 20% water, right? Also, which fuel do you use here methanol, isopropyl, denatured, or other?

JoeLonghair

Yes my man I am talking 90% fuel + 10% water / 80% fuel + 20% water and as for the fuel its methalated sprits, its a real good tip, this guy in a camp shop told me & then months later it was on the Trangia website. It really cuts down the soot almost next to nothing, you can add more water, depends what you want. Any way since we are on the topic I thought to put this list together for all you international tourers..


How to find meths (methylated spirits)
Country Name Picture Price per litre Where to buy it UK Methylated spirit £5 1) Hardware stores
2) Camp/outdoor stores
3) Pharmacies
Purple Tastes nasty, keep your burner out of your pans
France Alcool a bruler €1.50 All largeish supermarkets Clear
Does not taste bad, keep your burner in your pans.



Italy Alcool Etilico denaturato €2-3 1) All pharmacies, but beware of being offered the pure and very expensive version.
2) Some, smaller supermarkets have it in half litre bottles, where it is cheaper Pink
Tastes really bad

Greece "ino - pneuma"
€1.20 All small and large general stores Blue in half litre bottles, tastes OK.
This country is great! anywhere you can get food, you get meths.

Bulgaria "Spirt"
€1.60 In about one in five small general stores Although the bottle in the photo is blue, I have seen an orange one. Half litre glass bottles
Romania The label says "Alcool Sanitar" but the locals refer to it as "Spirt" €1.20 Found in pretty much all general stores in any village. Various brands available, always blue.
This is only 70% or 75% alcohol, but it burns ok, taking longer to boil water.
It is too slow for melting snow and needs real tender loving care to light on cold mornings.
Alcool Tehnic
BEST OPTION €1.00 In some, but not all village stores. Ask for it, as it is not always on display Purple
This stuff is the business. It is 90% alcohol.

Ukraine and Russia ,
Very hard to get 100 ml ! €4.00 After searching widely I found one pharmacy selling 100 ml bottles. Not every pharmacy sells them. I have used solid blocks of hexy fuel as an alternative.
TABLETOK (solid hexy fuel)
€1.00 for 24 cubes. Found in hardware stores (Rospodari Tovari) Found once at a bike bits stall at the market Each cube boils 0.5 litre of water. Place the cube on a bit of tin can balanced over where the burner normally goes.

Siberia I have to admit failure here. If you are travelling the trans siberian route. The mosquitos are so numerous, cooking is onorous. The cafes do good food for 2 dollars a meal and are at 40 km intervals. This is cheaper than buying food. A thermos is nice here if you are a tea addict. They will fill it for less than 20 cents. It will keep overnight for a hot cup in the morning without opening the tent door! I have read of friend getting meths in Irkutz with the help of a British Petroleum company. It is a by product of vodka manufacture and called spirt.

Mongolia More bad news. Bring a petrol stove.
China

Thankyou to Li of Norwich for this information $1 It can be found in one out of five pharmacies. Head for the ones with people having drips administered (Identified by red crosses) These sell 500 ml bottles. Any large/ medium town will have it if you search.
The upper bottle I found in a general grocery store. Also we are told in hardware stores. Less than one in 10 stores had it. Is 95 %, burns well and does not taste bad.
The stuff from the grocery or hardware stores is less than 95%, but burns tolerably well.

Laos Alcool

$2.5 The 'supplier type' pharmacy has litres for sale. Smaller places have 100 ml bottles
We bought in Udomxai, so larger places eg. Luang Prabang probably all have it. 90 %
clear
nb. cafe food so cheap, little meths needed on main routes.

Thailand Isopropanol
(Could not find meths, but Isopropanol burns ok in this heat)
Special care needed above 30 degrees shade temp, stove burns like a demon. $2.10 Pharmacies have 500 ml bottles Keep your burner seperately from the pans. I have a vague memory that Isopropanol is POISONOUS I have not tasted it!
Most people will not need trangia here, food cheap and available along the road every 3 km ish. Water heating coils on sale here are great for a hot cup.

Malaysia Methylated spirit $3.00 Sold in the pharmacy. 2 out of 3 pharmacies in Penang had it. Clear, burns well.
Heating coil is a good way to save buying water here if in hotels.

Spain Alcohol de Quemar Info from Steve Lord (Thanks) Cheap Grocery shops
readily available

Hope this helps

Magictofu

Hey Joe: your list can be found on this website: https://www.mark-ju.net/juliette/meths.htm

JoeLonghair

Yeah, I did copy it from some website and saved it to my "Bike Stuff file" never thought of posting it though, sure its going to be useful to some one.

Kodama

I typically just buy HEET for my alcohol stove and it works just fine. However I notice that REI now sells Denatured Alcohol in a larger can. Has anyone used this and are able to comment on its burning cleanliness?

abbub

I get my denatured alcohol from the paint section at Ace Hardware. It burns really clean.

Kodama

Is it cheaper then the REI? - which is US$6.60 a quart. This is cheaper then the HEET and I'm going to be picking up a few other essentials so I'd like to just add in the alcohol. But not if it doesn't burn clean.

abbub

I think it was 4 bucks for a quart. I'm going to go get some before I leave for my trip next week, so I'll check then.

supcom

Anywhere would be cheaper than REI! Home Depot, Lowes, Walmart, Ace Hardware, etc. Denatured alcohol is widely available. HEET is a good source for a small quantity but beware that there are two flavors of HEET. One is methyl alcohol (you want) the other is isopropyl alcohol (you don't want). Although isoprophyl alcohol will burn, it does not burn as hot as methyl alcohol.

Kodama

Sure, but I for one don't quibble over US$2.00 - I consider my time more valuable and as I already need to go to REI for stuff that only they have I consider that a net savings. While on the road I certainly will hit the hardware stores. However I will always pay a premium for anything over stepping into a *Mart.

Anyway as I've been saying its all about the clean burning nature for me (I'm plenty familiar with the correct HEET to use) In Canada I was able to buy alcohol marketed for stoves and it was the best I've used. I'm curious if the REI stuff is equal quality. I think I'm just going to get it and I'll report back post tour.

gregw

Just a link to another thread for additional information about a Trangia cook-set. Read the review at / near the end. https://www.bikeforums.net/showthread.php?t=104310

Seanholio

If anyone wants to buy a pop-can style stove, but doesn't want to put in the work, I own the Vargo Triad , and she's a beaut!

EnLaCalle

FYI- I too have seen the soda can stove in action multiple times, as well as other sort of DIY stoves, and it works suprisingly well. And it's SUPER light. So if you make one, you can buy lighter pots/pans/etc. with the money that you'll save from not buying the MSR.

ks1g

It does change your cooking style - easiest seems to be where you just boil water to heat/rehydrate food. Simmering over the stove seems to be a hit or miss proposition, or at least takes practice. A couple of our Scouts tried them on a recent campout. Use with a cheap Walmart 1 qt "grease pot". One boy made an insulated pot cozy from aluminum covered bubble wrap (vent insulation). Bring water to boil, dump in couscous, cover and let sit in cozy to simmer. Worked great. While the couscous is getting ready, boil a second pot for hot water for soup, cocoa, whatever. these stoves work well for 1, maybe 2 people per stove. Size and weight is great for a solo camper. Make sure you use the right alchohol, though - one boy used the kind that has a more water in it and his pot was a sooty mess!

For a bigger group, it starts making sense to use cartridge or multifuel stoves that can cook for the group. Not much of a weight penalty if you spread the load across the group.

supcom

I made a pot cozy from a cheap walmart blue foam sleeping pad. Works exceptionally well. I measured about 5 deg F temp loss over about 15 minutes sitting in the cozy.

ezman

I took my bike (and stove) on a lot of planes. I would drain the fuel from the bottle and stove and leave the caps off for as long as I could and try to get rid of the "smell". It was a Svea 123 and I used gasoline. No caps seem to lessen the threat to people. But this was before 911.
Going out to get a soda.

jharte

Seanholio, of all the cool stoves I've seen (I looked at quite a few) that one is really cool! If my pop can stove wasn't homemade, I'd opt for Vargo Triad.

Rogerinchrist

Seeing as this thread has been going on for several months and you just mentioned "homemade stoves", here's a couple of links for ya.

Homemade Camping Stoves

Wings

Enjoy!!