I’ve been designing, building and messing about with meths (and sometimes wood) stoves for quite a few years now. Always looking to make the next one a little better than the previous … lighter, smaller, more efficient, etc.
Earlier in the year I’d been on few overnight trips where I didn’t bother to carry a stove. Not having a stove and eating cold food was fine but not having a brew wasn’t! Thinking that only a small 450ml mug was required to make tea, I decided to make a stove to suit the mug. The majority of stoves are just too big when cooking with a mug, you end up with most of the available head going up the sides and wasted. Something much smaller was required and the 8g stove was it.
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8g (left) and 22g meths stove … yes that is a 1p piece. |
Making such a small stove brings problems of its own. The tiny internal volume means the stove is very sensitive to alterations in pressure … a long time and tens of prototypes were required to find the solutions. Jet location, jet size and internal and external air vents all had to be experimented with until the optimum was found. I think the result was worth the effort.
As I’m sure you might have guessed the stoves weigh a whopping 8g and as you can see aren’t very big at all. I’ve now put both versions (8g and 22g) into ‘production’ so if you’re looking for a lightweight cooking solution you’re in luck.