[pct-l] Cooking with canned gas

[Jennifer Zimmerman]

My experience this summer was similar to Fireweed's except I don't have the
great data to back it up.  Our canister seemed to last forever on one
boil/day of 1-1.5 L water for our lunch.  I was also worried about the "dry
stretch" from Tahoe-Ashland, but even if we had ended up needing the fuel
we came across it at a few towns in that long section.

I used a Soto stove, the older model with the dome-shaped burner.  For a
windscreen I used a caldera cone fitted to our pot.  It rested on a long
rectangle of hardware cloth that I'd bend into a semicircle and stand on
edge around the canister when setting up the stove.  This left 3-4" of
clearance under the cone for air intake and ventilation.  When trying this
setup initially I was worried about the canister overheating, but it was
never an issue - the gap provided enough cooling and it never got more than
warm to the touch.  Once the weather got cold in Washington I think I even
got a boost to performance because some of the burner heat was redirected
down at the fuel can.  This was a very efficient setup and I would use it
again.

Canister availability in Southern California is good, so even if you run
out you probably won't have very long to go until you can buy another.  By
the time it becomes more scarce you ought to have a lot of confidence in
usage rate.

JZ



On Thu, Mar 27, 2014 at 2:29 PM, Mary Kwart <mkwart at gci.net> wrote:

>
> After I hiked the Colorado Trail and the Grand Enchantment It seemed I
> was getting quit a bit of use out of my isobutane canisters. I wanted
> to avoid having to send my self unnecessary canisters via the mail
> (allowed only by surface mail and labelled Consumer Commodity--ORM-D)
> so I buckled down and kept track of my canister use:
>
> I hiked the Oregon section of the PCT last August and finally got to
> definitively figure out how much fuel I use. I packed an MSR isobutane
> cartridge that had an 8 oz net weight. I boiled 1 3/4 cup of water
> daily and put the boiling water in a freezer ziplock with the food in
> a cozy to cook. I used a snow peak canister stove attachment and a
> titanium pot. It took 6.1 grams of fuel to boil 1 3/4 cup water. I
> still had about a quarter of the fuel canister left after I reached
> the Washington border Now I know how to gage what's left in all my
> partially used canisters at home. I can get about 37 days of 1 boil a
> day from a larger 8 OZ. MSR canister.
>
> This has been my experience. It is just FYI--but I think you will be
> pleasantly surprised by how long one canister of this type lasts when
> you only use it once a day to bring water to a boil
>
> I also second the opinion about keeping the canister in your sleeping
> bag if the temps approach freezing. I did this in Colorado a lot. I
> also found that if you spaced keeping the canister warm that holding
> it for about ten minutes under your clothes next to skin would warm it
> up enough to make it functional. I have also heard that keeping the
> canister upside down helps with combating cold issues, but haven't
> tried that.
>
> MSR also came out with a fuel mix that is supposedly better for a
> wider range of climate conditions. From the MSR website:  "MSR IsoPro
> is a performance-boosting, 80/20 blend of isobutane and propane, with
> the purest isobutane (5% or less n-butane) of any canister fuel. This
> clean-burning formulation maintains higher internal pressure at lower
> temperatures than standard butane/propane mixtures, delivering
> superior cold weather performance and more consistent output over the
> life of the canister."
>
> --Fireweed
>
>
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