Cycling UK Forum

My current water boiling setup is a MSR Pocket Rocket 2, a Titan kettle and a fire steel. At 225g it's light but I've found the performance to be really poor on windy days. I remember one particular day in NL where there was no good place to shelter the stove and I eventually gave up after 10 mins when it became obvious the gas would run out before the water boiled.

I can see a few ways to fix this, but am not sure which path to take:

1. Keep the existing stove and kettle and get something like the Optimus clip-on windshield (£15) to offer some basic wind protection. Total weight +87g
2. Consign the stove to the spares box (RRP £50) and go for a canister stove with better wind protection (probably the Soto Windmaster - £50 or so) Total weight: +14g
3. Same as above but go for a remote stove like the Kovea spider (£50ish) where I could use a concertina-style windshield without risk of the gas canister exploding (already got one in my spares box). Total weight +175g
4. Consign both stove and Titan kettle (RRP £70) to the spares box and spend £100 on a Jetboil Flash (+150g or so) or £50 on an Alpkit brukit (+ 360g)

I'm loathed to put my current setup in the spare parts box as overall it would have been cheaper to have taken my coffees in Fortnum and Mason than brew them by the side of the road, but I'm also nervous of throwing good money after bad.

Currently leaning towards the Windmaster but would it really make much difference?

I bought a Wilko aluminium windshield about 10 years ago and it made such a difference I bought another just in case. About £6-8?
No longer sold there, but this looks really similar if not idential:
https://www.gooutdoors.co.uk/15989475/o ... -15989475/
I currently use a PocketRocket - OK but not as good as the £9 Wilko one it replaced! (The washer went after several years). I don't have shares in Wilko...

I do have a windshield like that already (very similar to this one from Decathlon) but had read that you shouldn't use them with canister mounted stoves as they can cause the gas canister to go boom...

There was some discussion of small quick boilers in 2019:
viewtopic.php?t=130447

and a long discussion of stoves in general from last year:
viewtopic.php?t=150713

Jonathan

PS:

bohrsatom wrote: ↑2 Apr 2023, 8:11pm I'm loathed...

Not here you're not. : - )

I haven't much to add to what I posted in that 2019 thread linked above. I'm a fan of the all-in-one heat exchanger pots, like the jetboil. I've had an original Jetboil, then tried but didn't like the Alpkit version and am currently happy with the smallest of the type a Primus Lite Plus.
If you think this type of stove may suit you, you could try one of the cheaper variants and if it does upgrade at some point, and if it doesn't, no great loss. The Planet X version is available, from them, on eBay for less than they're currently selling direct, £34 inc postage
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/404202788947 ... lIEALw_wcB

I'd recommend (and use) option 3, a remote canister stove with concertina wind shield.

Make sure that the stove has a preheat loop. This allows the canister to be turned upside down (one the stove is hot), avoiding most of the poor performance problems that can happen with half-used canisters or at low temperatures. A couple of stoves (MSR Windpro 2 and Optimus Vega) are designed for easy inverted canister use, which avoids an over-sensitive valve.

The windshield should be tall enough to come half way up the pan, and it may be handy to have some method of keeping the bottom edge a cm or so clear of the ground.

The most wind resistant stove available is the full-size Trangia (25 or 27), either meths or gas, but that wouldn't be a particularly light or compact option.

I'm super happy with my little Alpkit burner https://alpkit.com/products/koro and its associated windshield https://alpkit.com/products/concertina. Seems to do the trick for me in the windiest of conditions.

PH wrote: ↑2 Apr 2023, 10:07pm.
If you think this type of stove may suit you, you could try one of the cheaper variants and if it does upgrade at some point, and if it doesn't, no great loss. The Planet X version is available, from them, on eBay for less than they're currently selling direct, £34 inc postage
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/404202788947 ... lIEALw_wcB

If you put the Planet X in your watch list you’ll get an offer of £27 + p&p Total £31

I’m tempted

andrew_s wrote: ↑2 Apr 2023, 11:58pm This allows the canister to be turned upside down (one the stove is hot), avoiding most of the poor performance problems that can happen with half-used canisters or at low temperatures. A couple of stoves (MSR Windpro 2 and Optimus Vega) are designed for easy inverted canister use, which avoids an over-sensitive valve.

If you can't do that, standing the cannister in a couple of cm of lukewarm water has the same effect, basically keeping the butane and propane mixed.

I currently use a Soto Windmaster with a folding kettle or previously an Edelrid Al kettle. I've used it in some pretty windy locations along the North Sea and Baltic coasts, its always done the job, maybe not quite as quickly as on calmer days but not overly longer. Sure i read somewhere that you shouldn't use a windshield with it as it can get too hot! The integrated Piezzo means it ignites pretty much everytime without any of the issues i've had with external ignition over the years

Previously i used a Markill Peak Ignition, great stove but it would flutter and even extinguish if it was a bit breezy.

PH wrote: ↑3 Apr 2023, 7:44pm

andrew_s wrote: ↑2 Apr 2023, 11:58pm This allows the canister to be turned upside down (once the stove is hot), avoiding most of the poor performance problems that can happen with half-used canisters or at low temperatures. A couple of stoves (MSR Windpro 2 and Optimus Vega) are designed for easy inverted canister use, which avoids an over-sensitive valve.

If you can't do that, standing the cannister in a couple of cm of lukewarm water has the same effect, basically keeping the butane and propane mixed.

That doesn't work the same.

You'll get a bit of extra pressure & performance by providing more heat to evaporate the liquid gas with, but it won't be near full canister/warm weather performance.

The basic problem is that with the canister upright, you are burning the gas that evaporates/boils off from the surface of the liquid inside the canister, and that gas always contains a higher proportion of the more volatile propane than does the liquid gas below. The end result is that by the time your 70% butane, 30% propane canister is much more than half used, there's not much of the propane left. If it's cold, like in the morning in pre-midge season Scotland, it may then not be possible to get the stove started without using body heat to get the canister warmed up some.

If you mostly use the canister upside down, you are feeding liquid gas into the preheat tube, and burning gas that's of the same proportions as in the bulk liquid, so an 80% used canister still contains a good proportion of propane, allowing easy starting of the stove.

You can get round the problem of low temperature/part-used canister performance to some extent by paying extra for gas canisters that have an isobutane-propane mix (such as Jetboil Jetpower). Isobutane* boils at -12°, so the stove will carry on working OK down to a bit below zero even when all the propane has gone (and the propane content lasts longer).

* Normal n-butane (boils at -0.5°) has 4 carbon atoms in a line, isobutane has them in a Y

andrew_s wrote: ↑3 Apr 2023, 11:49pm

PH wrote: ↑3 Apr 2023, 7:44pm

andrew_s wrote: ↑2 Apr 2023, 11:58pm This allows the canister to be turned upside down

If you can't do that, standing the cannister in a couple of cm of lukewarm water

That doesn't work the same.

Brucey's explanation:
viewtopic.php?p=1368280&hilit=butane#p1368280

Have you tried it? I have and it works fine for me, the time to boil .5l water is as consistent with a Jetboil stood in a little water as it was with my alpine stove.

Can-top microstoves really do suffer in the wind, I have a wee OD titanium one I won in a competition but rarely use because I'm happier with the overall ease of use of a Primus Gravity remote can stove than saving the grams, but having said that it's in the context of a general cooking stove, not juts a water boiler.

Thus, my advice for a general cooking system is a remote can stove with a windshield, but if all you're doing is making a brew then something like a JetBoil would make more sense.

Or carry a flask of either your favoured drink or hot water to make it (that works better for coffee or chocolate than tea).

Pete.

I used to use similar to OP (MSR but different pan). Just for boiling water fore coffees.

I didn't like it as I found the MSR very unreliable or rather they fail too often (*mid-tour). Also, by the time you have a larger canister (e.g. NL) or a larger canister and a bayonet adapter (France) the pan is getting quite high and it's all a bit unstable.

Last summer I switched to a Primus OmniLite - very expensive but I really like it (only used with gas so far).

Ian

Psamathe wrote: ↑4 Apr 2023, 12:54pm Last summer I switched to a Primus OmniLite - very expensive but I really like it (only used with gas so far).

We have a rather older iteration of the Primus, the original MFS (multi fuel stove), which does gas as well as paraffin and petrol. And while it does do gas okay it is substantially less good than our pure-gas Primus Gravity, mainly because that has a dedicated gas burner with lots of holes rather than a general purpose spreader for multiple fuel types.

Thus, if you have a gas-only trip on the cards it might be worth supplementing the OmniLite with something like a Gravity as it's quieter and better for fine control. I never bothered measuring but I wouldn't be too surprised if it works a bit efficiently too.

Pete.