Hi Bob,
Maybe stick stoves are not for me. I do like alcohol stove for a quick morning coffee. It's not that I don't have experience using stick stoves. I do, but I enjoy them more for the novelty than utility. I ended up selling them last year in a big purge because I have too much camping stuff.
When it came to trips they just never made it past the cut. Packability and weight always put them in the discard pile. Most of my trips are long weekend affairs. The weight, convenience and packability of alcohol stoves always beat out wood on short trips. I should note that I typically cook half of my meals over a plain old fire anyway.
The Firebox Stove is great because it packs down small and has a huge burn chamber. It got cut because it weighs 2 pounds! The Kelley Kettle is by far the fastest burner of them all. But, loses in just about every other department. It is 1.7 pounds! Way to big, and has a real capacity of about 450ml. The Tack 180 Stove at 11 oz is really more of a small portable grill. It just holds a pot off a small twig fire but does nothing to aid combustion. I will eventually replace that with a Purcell Grill.
The Bush Buddy on the other hands packs perfectly inside my 1l pot along side a lighter, spork, scrubby, bandana etc.. It is almost as packable as my alcohol setup. The small advantage my alcohol set up has is that my mug also fits inside the pot. So I will have to find somewhere else for it when using the Bush Buddy. From a weight point of view the Bush Buddy only weighs 7oz. It doesn't take more than a couple of days before alcohol loses it's weight advantage. So, the only thing I sacrifice using a Bush buddy is some convenience.
I'm willing to give it a go. Plus it's a new toy to play with!
Last edited by MartinG (8/14/2016 9:10 am)
