to build a fire

... well, stove actually. But Jack London's short story of the same name left a strong impact on me. Man struggling to live in the world he's been brought in to. Fighting the weather, and his own psyche... Things will be a bit easier for me. First off, it won't be -20 f where I'll be, and I'll be carrying a lighter. None of this flint and steel thing.

So, I've been looking to take 5 lbs off of my loaded base pack weight and am re-assessing all the gear I've got. Most of my backpacking is with a small group of 2-4 people, and so my gear is suited for that. But since I'll be doing the bulk of the AT solo, there are a lot of items that don't need to be as large or robust as what I have now.

This weekend I was looking at stoves. I have an MSR Whisperlite Internationale. A great stove for most everything I use it for. It's reliable, rugged, and works for large and small groups. But it also weighs about 2 lbs when you include the fuel bottle. Not bad, but there are plenty of ultralight alternatives for the solo hiker. I started checking out the web, and came across something that peaked my geek-builder interest a bit more than the others. It's the soda can stove. A small, build-it-yourself alcohol stove of the type that many long distance hikers have started to use on the trail because of their small size and and reliability. There are many different designs out there. The one I finally decided on is Scott Henderson's Pepsi-G stove. In reviews, it seems to have a good balance of fuel efficiency and durability. It also has great visual step-by-step build instructions and it looks freakin' cool!

So I set about putting it together. All of the detailed instructions are at Scott's site, so I'm going to give you a down and dirty version. First thing is to buy the supplies. One can of Pepsi, One can of Guinness, and J-B Weld (basically, a high temperature glue). Punch some holes, cut the bottoms off the cans, build a little inner wall, glue them together and you have a cool little stove! All in all it took only a few hours to assemble everything. But the big question is will it work!

One of the more important things to get right is the jet holes. After the alcohol vaporizes into gas, it escapes out of the jet holes and ignites. This is where the bulk of the stove gets it's heat from. M inspects my work with her keen cat-like eyes for any defects.




Here's the completed stove. All glued together and ready to take on some fuel. I must say, it's really a pretty little object on it's own. Kind of like a cockroach ufo. At around 1 oz, It's 1/20th the weight of my Whisperlite stove.




So,after I finished the build, I went to the nearby Home Depot and picked up some denatured alcohol, one of the fuels of choice for this stove. Came home, set up the little stove under the vent in the kitchen, and put about 1 tbsp of alcohol in to the center part. And it worked! After about 45 seconds of the stove self-priming itself, the little jets around the top sparked to life and a little mini stove is born!

I ran a number of tests in the kitchen and it seems like this little bugger has the potential to work out great. It took about 4 minutes for 16 oz of water to come to a rolling boil, and used up only around 1 tbsp of fuel. There is one or two other designs that I'd like to pursue, but for now this thing looks like it'll work great! This weekend is my big solo test of the gear I've got and the Pepsi-G will definitely be coming along for the ride. I have yet to figure out how to create an adequate simmer ring, but I'm still experimenting with designs, and it's a fairly minimal item. I'll most likely do more of a "keep it warm with a coozy" approach to cooking to save fuel. Basically all that means is I'll heat the water to boiling and then keep it warm in a coozy instead of on top of the stove.

* If you are interested in making your own, I strongly recommend you check out www.zenstoves.net. They have a great selection of different designs and information on making alcohol stoves.