Backpacking Stoves

Backpacking stoves are an interesting subject where different people have completely different opinions.  So I'll offer my opinion on the pros and cons of each of the ones below, but understand that it's my opinion based on my camping experiences.  Below is a photo of the 3 backpacking stoves I have access to.  The one on the left is our troop's stove, made by Coleman.  The middle one is mine, and it's also made by Coleman.  The one on the right is a woodgas stove that burns wood instead of gas.  Each of the stoves below cost approximately the same ($50-$80, depending on where you get it).

The 3 stoves I have access to

So, the first one is a Coleman Featherlight Exponent backpacking stove.  It will run off of white gas, unleaded gas, or kerosene.  I don't picture using the kerosene feature much, but the white gas and unleaded makes it so that if you run out of white gas you can siphon gas out of a stranded vehicle and still cook food.  It's fairly small, but not the lightest thing out there.  It weighs 24 oz empty and gives out 7,500 Btu's of heat on high.  Tank holds .34 L and will burn for 1.5 hours.

Coleman Featherlight Exponent Stove

Here's my first stove.  It's a Coleman Dual Fuel 533.  It will burn white gas or unleaded as well, but not kerosene.  It is larger than the Exponent (above), and weighs 14.5 ounces more as well at 38.5 oz.  It has a larger tank (0.52 L) which will provide 10,500 Btu's (high) for 1.75 hours.

Coleman Dual Fuel 533 Stove

Here's my new stove (below).  I got it from THIS WEBSITE.  It's called a Biomass Wood gas Stove.  It burns wood, but has a fan run by 2 AA Batteries that allows you to burn the wood gas at a more consistent rate.  At high it gives off 10,500 Btu's and at low it gives 5,000 Btu's.  Unfortunately it's either high or low, nothing in between.  But, you don't need any gas, just batteries, and 2 AA Batteries are supposed to last 10 hours on high or 11 hours on low.

Biomass Wood Gas Stove

Let's see, compared to the stove above that would be: 10 hours/1.75 hours = 5.7, and 0.52L x 5.7 = 2.9 L of gas needed to burn for 10 hours on the Coleman Dual Fuel Stove!  Thats approximately 3 quarts of fuel, weighing a total of 6 pounds!


So, weight of Coleman Stove (38.5 oz) + weight of fuel to burn for 10 hours (6 pounds) = 8.4 pounds!
While the weight of the Wood Gas Stove is 1.6 pounds (battery and carrying bag included)!  That's 6.8 pounds less!

Plus, white gas is about $9 per gallon right now.  1 Gallon gas will burn (on high with the dual fuel stove) for approximately 13.3 hours.  While with two sets of 2-AA Batteries you can burn for 20 hours.  What do AA Batteries cost now, maybe $4 for a set of 4?  So, for the same cost as the gas ($9), you could burn your wood gas stove for approximately 40-50 HOURS (instead of 13 hours).

So, suffice it to say that I'm pretty excited about using it.  I have tried it out in the backyard and it worked great there, but I'd love to take it on a backpacking trip (I'll go on at least one this spring) and compare it side by side with the Coleman Stoves.

As I've stated in earlier posts, I like the white gas stoves because the white gas will work at lower temperatures much better than propane, or some of the other gases out there.  I've been on camping trips when people have had the butane tanks or whatever that come pre-pressurized and ready to go - simple, right?  But then some of the tanks would only use up about 1/2 of the gas.  We could tell there was more in there, but it wouldn't come out.  With white gas, you can open the lid and see how much is in there (and you know how much you put in there, you don't have to guess on your next trip how much is actually in the half used tank), and you know you can get it all out.

A word of caution:  If there is a ban on open fires in your wilderness area, you can't use the wood gas stove.  You'll have to use the Coleman stove or another of your choice.

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