Bushwalk Australia

I made a Soda Can stove, like the one in this video today.



However, mine did not perform as shown.

Added some water as suggested in video and one ounce of Metho. I had an idea of using a coin instead of the bolt to seal the fill hole. Lit my lighter, bought the lighter closer to the stove, when all of a sudden BOOM!. *&%$#! . That was loud.

What did I do wrong, I emailed Brian that made the video. and he informed I did not fill the stove enough. I have to fill above the fill hole than light.

My 2nd attempt was not all that much better, but at least if did not explode.

More to come.

2nd attempt.

I filled up as Brian suggested, I was a bit nervous, waiting for another explosion, but not this time. PHEW.
However a lot of pressure built up in the stove and my coin was not stopping the fuel coming out the fill hole, eventually it overflowed and started a great ball of fire. I bolted.

The ball of fire tamed down after a while and it started to work ok. Eventually, I had flames coming out of the 3 1/16th holes I drilled. But after a few minutes the flame went out. There was still a lot of metho in the stove.

3rd attempt:
I grabbed a rivet to cover the fill hole this time. filled up the container till it covered over the fill hole. Placed the rivet in the fill hole and lit the stove. I than placed the oven over the stove and it taken 10 minutes for the stove to obtain 400F. Once it reached 400F it continued to rise, got to 450F so I opened the top vent and it still continued to rise, Got to almost 500F, when I decided to open the front door a tad to get the temp down to 400F. after a couple minutes the temp got to 400F. I closed the door and it maintained this temp for a few more minutes. At the 10 minute point of sustaining the 400F temp on the oven, the temp of the oven started to go down. For the rest of the burn time, the oven could only manage 250F.

Here's the details in more detail of my test, with some images.

Filled Homemade Soda can stove with almost 3 ounces of Metho.
Soda Stove taken 10 minutes to reach 400F on the Bemco Oven.
Maintained minimum 400F for 10 minutes.
After the 10 minute mark, the stove was only able to sustain 250-300F
Stove ran for further 10 minutes before flame went out.

Once I Lit the stove, it remained lit for 30 minutes.
When the stoves flame went out, there was still one ounce of fuel left in stove that did not burn.

I don't know what I've done wrong, but it's not working out for me.

I must be doing something wrong. Watching the youtube Video on using the Soda Can stove, Mine is not performing like that.

Ive not had much to do with fuel stoves in my time except for the kero one I had 33 years ago that my friend convinced me to dump as we were going to hitch a ride and it was to much stuff to carry. Is there any difference between Metho and De-nature d alcohol? If so that my be your problem. If not interesting experiment to say the least.

How about this: http://www.thesodacanstove.com/alcohol- ... oting.html

How good is the seal between the inner and the outer parts of your stove?

I believe it's got a very good seal, it was a tight fit.

I just made another one a lot larger than the first. and changed the position of the 3 1/16th holes I drilled for the jets to the inner part of the top of the stove instead of the outer. I will try this tomorrow, but being a larger stove, it's going to take some metho to fuel, it's kind of got me a bit nervous on the outcome.

I'm glad you're not doing this in your new tent Phil.........

Google penny stoves.
Ive not seen anywhere they only have 3 wacking big holes as jets.
You might be on to something but it also might be the problem.
Locating them inside the ridge is a bit wrong too.

I built a few alcohol stoves a couple of years ago but I had the opposite problem. They just didn't generate enough heat to actually boil water, even in benign conditions. One was the penny stove, one a catfood can stove and the third was... I forget now. All disappointing and so I have stuck with using gas.

No explosions. Although I did start a few small fires.

Rob A wrote:Google penny stoves.
Ive not seen anywhere they only have 3 wacking big holes as jets.
You might be on to something but it also might be the problem.
Locating them inside the ridge is a bit wrong too.

The one in the image I first made has the 3 holes on the outside of the ridge.
The stove used in the video footage i posted has the holes inside the ridge, Ive not tried the latest stove thus far.

Rob A wrote:Google penny stoves.
Ive not seen anywhere they only have 3 wacking big holes as jets.
You might be on to something but it also might be the problem.
Locating them inside the ridge is a bit wrong too.

I have, i spent hours yesterday googling and watching penny stoves, theres nothing out there like this.

I should explain, my goal with this stove is to only use it as a heat source for my Bemco backpacking oven and nothing else, its not for boiling water. Therefore my goal is to achieve 200C for as long as possible or at least 25 minutes at 200C temp on my oven. It will be used for at home or vehicle based camping.

My last stove I made: I could not get more than 75C out of my oven with this stove, It was a total failure, Not enough heat coming out of it.

I think I might be best to give this idea a miss. It's not going to work. Somehow it works in the states as shown in that footage I posted in the 1st post. Maybe out fuel is different to what they use in the states. I might have to continue my search on a MSR cooking system.

I wonder if he glass wools the inside and whether that would provide a more even evaporation?
Sixteenth still sounds a bit big even if you are cutting hole number right down for long burn.
Used to use a 1mm bit but you need a small chuck to hold it.

They are a bit of fun, but I agree with you, at the end of the day they are toys and a bit of a waste of time.

Rob A wrote:I wonder if he glass wools the inside and whether that would provide a more even evaporation?
Sixteenth still sounds a bit big even if you are cutting hole number right down for long burn.
Used to use a 1mm bit but you need a small chuck to hold it.

They are a bit of fun, but I agree with you, at the end of the day they are toys and a bit of a waste of time.

Especially when they don't work. If it had of worked out, the time would have been greatly spent.

Need to look into another source of heat for my Oven's use at home and vehicle based camping, I'm considering using a gas cooker, I did use a gas cooker, but it generated a leak at the simmer adjustment on my Kovea SupaLite Titanium on my 3rd baking attempt with the oven. I sent the Kovea to the repair agent this week, and they where very surprised it leaked where it did, It's the first he had ever seen. They replaced with a brand new Kovea Stove, which arrived yesterday, I'm to scared to use in on my oven again, just incase this was the cause of the leak, even though the repair agent said, that this was not caused by heat, he thinks it could have been a manufacturing fault from day one and it was just a coincidence it started to leak while I was using the oven. I'm still not convinced, so I'm not going to use this Kovea on my oven. I know the MSR Pocket Rocket is very successful with this Oven of mine.

The MSR Shellite cooking kits are also very successful, but shellite to expensive so that option is out for me.

Take heart. Even when you get the things powering along like demons, the weather will change and the barometer will drop and you will be back to square one trying to figure out where it all went wrong.

Make some more of the things next time you are rocovering from surgery and cant think of anything better to do.

The Kovea SupaLite Titanium has an O ring seal at the nozzle/ tap? And you put this in the oven? Where was the gas can?

Rob A wrote:Take heart. Even when you get the things powering along like demons, the weather will change and the barometer will drop and you will be back to square one trying to figure out where it all went wrong.

Make some more of the things next time you are rocovering from surgery and cant think of anything better to do.

The Kovea SupaLite Titanium has an O ring seal at the nozzle/ tap? And you put this in the oven? Where was the gas can?

Gas can was outside the oven, I used this adaptor I purchased from Ebay.
http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/121014837567 ... 1497.l2649