Trangia Camping Stove

the pans get covered in soot

Its the purple dye in meths that creates the soot – if using abroad you can buy cleaner spirit –  ‘Alcol a bruler’ in France for instance – that isnt methelateted so doesn’t smell or create soot.

Here you can get cans of alcohol gel to use in place of the spirit burner that are cleaner and more pleasant

you’ll be waiting a long time for water to boil with an open pan.

What do you think the frying pan is for?!
The kettle is a better experience. Quicker, neater, easier to pour, but you can definatly do without it, as you can use the frying pan as a pot lid.

Ive used a few options, ive got a fleet of pocket rockets, but i always return to the Trangia.
A pocket rocket might be lighter, but by the time youve included the pot, and a windbreak, and a paving slab as a flat surface to put it on so it doesnt topple over it isnt worth it to me.

When bivying once, i took just the kettle, the burner and three tent pegs. Spike the pegs to hold the kettle, and pop the burner underneath. Worked well!

I also add a little water to meths to reduce soot build up, and any soot you do get just wipes off.
Though i tend to use bioethanol now. doesnt stink, doesnt taste bitter if you get it on your fingers. burns well. Great stuff.

Dont lose the litle yellow bag. Meths eats aluminium i found. Went to boil my kettle, and by the time it was boiling, it was empty. Lots of little pin prick holes in the bottom of the kettle.

My kettle is a different shape to that! Which is good as it then holds a gas burner inside just fine. I then don’t need to carry the frying pan. You need to work out what combination works for what situation.. I use my Trangia kit all the time, I just don’t use the meths burner as it takes too long for my needs/tastes

@maccruiskeen do you mean chaffing fuel?

You can bio ethanol for stoves here it not that expensive.

I don’t like the gas stoves because no matter what way you cut it they’re a waste of resources – steel and oil.

Out of interest how does refilling work surely at best you get is equalisation of pressure?

If you refill into 250 into 3 100s you must end up with three little canisters almost full and a Fourth larger one with some left in it that you are immediately chucked in a bin?

Flexibility.

But how is carrying multiple 100g canisters more flexible?

Carrying a single 100g cannister on short trips between which you top up at home from a big can makes perfect sense, it’s substantially cheaper and less weight to carry. But you’re not explaining why you carry 3x 100g cannisters (which will weigh quite a bit more than 1x 250g).

Surely you could use IPA as fuel? I don’t think you can buy it in shops but it’s widely available on eBay.

Out of interest how does refilling work surely at best you get is equalisation of pressure?

As far as I know the adapter simply connects two canisters, one upside down on top of the other so the pressure is the same in both. Then I guess the liquid just dribbles down under gravity. I guess you could warm the top one gently with your hands, that will push the liquid down into the bottom one, and if you let go gas would bubble. back up and then repeat if it’s taking too long.

But you’re not explaining why you carry 3x 100g cannisters (which will weigh quite a bit more than 1x 250g).

If you are using bikepacking style luggage strapped to your bike you might need more small items instead of one large one – it’s not like packing a rucksack.

It does need a pressure differential to refill cans – but the top one is the full one and is upside down – so the pressure differential forces liquid gas thru until it equalizes. An empty can is at lower pressure than a full one tho a few degrees of temp difference makes it easier.  Ie top one in your pocket for a few mins, bottom one outside.  When I do it in the house I put the empty in the freezer for a few mins but then you can overfil

Its nothing to do with gravity.  its the pressure differential

it does not work like molgrips says – you do not get bubbles back up at all.

I have done this for decades.  Easy and safe.  its no difference to screwing and unscrewing cans from the stove.  Eventually valves will fail.  I had one refuse to put gas into the stove after refilling, I have had one fail open slightly.  these were cans that had been refilled many times .  beware over filling.

I think sometimes people think the kettle boils faster as they don’t compare like with like and compare boiling the kettle with a comparatively small amount of water in it with a pan with more. Heat a pan with say 500ml in it (and the frying pan flipped as a lid and a kettle with the same volume of water and I doubt there is much in the boil times.

Its the purple dye in meths that creates the soot – if using abroad you can buy cleaner spirit – ‘Alcol a bruler’ in France for instance – that isnt methelateted so doesn’t smell or create soot.

If that’s true, you can remove the dye by leaving it out in the sun for a while as U light breaks it down.

Surely you could use IPA as fuel? I don’t think you can buy it in shops but it’s widely available on eBay.

Doesn’t work. IPA is C3H7OH, meths is ethanol C2H5OH. It’s more energy dese but boils at a higher temperature so you’re not getting as much vaporization. On top of that it’s a bigger molecule so produces a lot more soot. Maybe someone could design a stove that ran on IPA but it would probably look more like those primus stoves with the pre-heat tube.

n.b. on both points “Meths” is Ethanol, the name comes form when it used to be spiked with Methanol to make it undrinkable without going blind. Turned out this wasn’t sufficient a deterrent so it’s now just ethanol, water, bitrex and colouring.

@TJagain

I know that, that wasn’t the question.

On my big trip I took 3 x 100g gas cans and bought a 250 g can to refill them from when they got low

The question was why carry 3x 100g cans on a trip and presumably refill them in a Carrefour car park, rather than just cook from the 250g cannister?

But how is carrying multiple 100g canisters more flexible?

When its cold in the morning I can put a full can on for best pressure, when its warm in the evening put the almost empty one on to cook tea.  Better gas pressure when its hot or the can is full.  Trying to make coffee off an almost empty one in the morning is too hard for me.  I can run two cans out completely then have the third one for use while waiting to buy a 250 g one.  Use the 250 g one to refill the two empties and to top up the part full one. or use the last bit of gas in the 250g one to cook my tea depending on how much is left in the third can

It just gives more combinations you can use and makes sure you always have a full one to make sure the first thing in the morning coffee was made with a full can

I have done this for years.  yes its a small weight penalty but the 3x 100g gives more flexibility and is similar weight to a 250 and a 100g .  Refills work better from a large to a small can  i always carry at least 2 cans in case one fails

I only do this for long trips tho – short ones is 2x100g as that will last me 10 days

Out of interest how are you judging ‘full’ without scales? Condensatation on the can?

Shake it to check for air gap and experience after doing it for years.  You can only overfill if you have a big temp differnce.  I have checked on scales so i know whats about right.  Too full and you get liquid gas out when you connect to the stove for a double check.  You need a gap for expansion in heat

Out of interest how are you judging ‘full’ without scales? Condensatation on the can?

Not sure how TJ does it but I do the float check. Some cans even have markings on the side for this.

thisisnotaspoon
n.b. on both points “Meths” is Ethanol, the name comes form when it used to be spiked with Methanol to make it undrinkable without going blind.

Eh? If meths is ethanol, how can you spike ethanol with methanol?

Finbar

Eh? If meths is ethanol, how can you spike ethanol with methanol?

Methylated spirits used to be ethanol with methanol added to make it poisonous. The ethanol (or ‘spirit’) was methylated by adding the methanol.
They used to put enough methanol in to make it poisonous, so the manufacturer (and end user) didn’t have to pay the duty that, for example would be paid on a bottle of vodka.
The rate of duty is currently £28.74 per litre of ethanol:
Alcohol duties – Office for Budget Responsibility

However, being poisonous was not always a sufficient deterrent for some people when they hit rock bottom.
My brother used to work for the Department of Social Security – he said that the staff in the benefits office would notice a client’s hair had suddenly turned white, and they looked worse than normal for a few weeks. Then the staff wouldn’t see them any more, and maybe read about their death in the paper.
Very sad.

Hence, as thisisnotaspoon says above, meths now just ethanol, water, bitrex and colouring.
Bitrex: Wikipedia article on Denatonium

Aha! I thought methanol and methylated spirits were the same thing (you can tell I never was any good at chemistry). Thanks for explaining.

Duplicate post

I love my Trangia, but it’s very slow to boil water, terrible in even the slightest wind, heavy and bulky.

I’ve got a Kelly kettle and a twig stove which are good in certain conditions, but 95% of the time I use the Trang. That’s for backpacking, bikepacking and moto touring. Honestly don’t care about weight bulk or boiling time – I put the kettle on, pack up my stuff or go for a poo or something, and it’s boiling. At work, I use the 27 almost daily to reheat veggie slop.

I use 99% alcohol metílico which I suppose is meths, and can be bought in any small supermarket in Spain – it’s with the cleaning products. It works okay, needs to get properly hot before putting the simmer ring on, otherwise it goes out. Alcool de bruler in France works sufficiently well, but ISTR it worked better on British purple meths, forrin stuff burns cooler, faster, or sootier, depending on what it is.

Its possible to cut the inside holey base section of a Trangia and the corresponding vertical square holey air vent section then fit a Whisperlite inside so the pipe to the fuel bottle passes through the Trangia wall. Stove and everything packs inside the Trangia too. Burns any fuel, no soot and fast as chips.

Genius !

Its possible to cut the inside holey base section of a Trangia and the corresponding vertical square holey air vent section then fit a Whisperlite inside so the pipe to the fuel bottle passes through the Trangia wall. Stove and everything packs inside the Trangia too. Burns any fuel, no soot and fast as chips.

There was a fitting kit for that, like there still are for Trangia gas burners. I have a friend with one.

There was a fitting kit for that, like there still are for Trangia gas burners. I have a friend with one

I didn’t know that… I did mine with scissors in the early 90’s at Outward Bound Eskdale….

After years with Trangia, I keep it as the best solution in windy conditions, but the original alcohol burner is not perfect.  Adding 10% methanol to the Ethanol and no more soot 🙂

Still not good enough so I got my selves the original Trangia version of the Optimus Nova. Just fantastic! Nothing works better.  I tried the butane burner, and that works well in the summer. Two good solutions!  🙂
But I want more 🙂  When it is not windy I would like to be able to use the stove without the windshield, and I do not want to make great modification of the Trangia.  You may find some photos of  some solutions in this Norwegian tread: https://www.fjellforum.no/topic/46396-det-ideelle-trangia-oppsettet/#comment-547862
Still not sure about what is the best solution. Do you have more ideas?