Alcohol Stove Conversion

[Dramanaut]

I believe you can still order kerosene burners and parts from Base Camp out of England. I purchased parts from them last summer. Haven't gotten around to rebuilding the leaky burner yet. Anybody in the Olympia area able to help me? I am afraid of messing it up.

base-camp.co.uk

[Bergovoy]

so, the consensus is for kerosene, instead of propane? hmmm...

[Dramanaut]

One burns and the other goes boom; the choice is yours. Propane is very nice to use, easier and less fiddly. I've used both. Dervish came with a pressure kero stove, and since I love the old school stuff, I am trying to make it work. I move aboard this week, so we'll soon find out. I think the risk of fire from liquid fuel is less scary than the risk of explosion with propane. Alcohol isn't hot enough, is less efficient and costs too much. Just my opinion.

[Bergovoy]

not hot enough? hmmm, that would bug me.. although, i am only basing this on my love of cooking on land... not sure what it is like or going to be for me when i finallyget on board...

[sck5]

"not h0t enough"

yet another person who has never used an Origo non pressurized alcohol stove. It isnt only about the heat content of one ml. of fuel which is where this myth (and it IS a myth) comes from. The burners are sized to compensate for fuel heat content. That is why you need alternative nipples for kerosene vs. other fuels.

[Dramanaut]

I have a Heatmate non-pressurized alcohol heater/stove. It takes a loooong time to boil water on that thing; perhaps the optimized stoves do better. I have assumed that is due to temperature. The boil time on my kero stove is quite fast when burning optimally probably around 4 minutes for a quart of water.

[Dramanaut]

Another plus for kerosene is the supposed 8 hour burn time for a pint. I have not tested this, personally, but I put a gallon in last year and used it from february to september without running out. Of course, that was weekend use. I am moving aboard this week, so at some point, I should be able to get a real number for burn time.

[foamcore]

I removed my Alcohol stove for two reasons. It is slow and it makes a lot of water. Put in a propane cook top and I'm happy with it. Easy install, except for placement of the tank!

[otherthan]

A good chef would want nothing but an alchol stove on his boat...cooking is an art...how often have you eat in a good restaurent and the food was cooked to perfection? well an origo 2 burner stove is just the right tool for the job...it has a 5000btu burner for gentle to moderate cooking and a 7000btu for all your other cooking needs.

knowing how to chouse your pans is important when cooking...they are tools and having the right tool makes life easy...if seen guys trying to cook a steak with olive oil in a teflon pan on the 5000btu side of an alchol stove, no good...steaks are the reason we have cast iron and butter.

I use this stove, not origo but just as good...and I asure you I have entertained the family at cristmas and everyone loved my cooking and astonished to learn that I used this stove exclusivly...my family is not the junk food type they are my best critics.

my opinion on propan...I use it for the BBQ but I dont call BBQ cooking...its more like burning food on the BBQ

on my boat no propan ever!!!!

final note...70% alchol is no good for cooking and yes produce alot of water vapor...use proper alchol not the cheep fondu stuf

[Sam Plan B]

I would not bother trying to convert the stove body. You can find second hand propane stoves. I bought a two burner + oven all stainless steel stove at Bacon Sails in Annapolis. It cost $225. It fit right in where the old alchohol stove had sat. The hoses, and solinoid valve cost some. And installing it all was work. I installed A T to provide gas hose to an aft cabin Force 10 heater. That also came from Bacon Sails.

[Scuba1]

get a couple of these MSR Dragonfly Stove - SportsDirect.com I use them and they will burn just about anything other then logs. You can run them on alcohol/ butane, diesel, kerosene or petrol .... lamp oil works as well it just has to be flammable and sort of liquid. they are all stainless construction and the burners are small enough to be built into a existing stove with a bit of tinkering.

[hummingway]

I don't imagine propane explosions are very common. I watched a boat burn in the Nanaimo harbour last year. It had burned a long time and was fully engulfed before the tanks flared. A little while later they blew with a good boom. It surprised me a little since their wasn't much left of the boat when the tanks finally went. My guess is they were in a proper storage hold. A leak would be a problem but if the tanks are always shut off after use, whether manually or with a selenoid, that shouldn't be a problem