I want to share a little secret with you, you may have already discovered it yourself, maybe you just haven't bothered to articulate it. The secret I want to share with you, is the reason why campers, hikers, travelers and adventurers do the things they (we) do. The reason why walking a hundred miles with forty pounds on your back is recreation, not punishment. Why dangling from a tent hammered into to ancient stone walls, hundreds of feet off the safety of the ground below is fun, not insanity. Why waking up on an inch of foam in the pouring rain, in the middle of a patch of Canada's endless forests, greeted by black flies and mosquitos is a treat, not torture. The secret is this...being outside amplifies the simple pleasures of life a thousand fold.
You like coffee in the morning, reading the paper before work? Sure you do. But you will plan for months, take off work, gear up, and hike for a week to enjoy a cup of coffee sitting on a rock by a ridge over looking the Baby of Fundy, or a Northern Ontario Lake, or a chunk of The West Coast's Majestic granite giants. Now you tell me, which cup of coffee was better, and by how much?
It is in the spirit of this secret revealed, that we will spend some time here on The Radical Edge Blog to talk about your potential weapon of choice while cooking on the trail. The bringer of heat to your meat, the sultan of steam to your tea, the...warmer-upper of your beans; the MIGHTY MSR CAMPING STOVE!
With the Summer season of camping in National and Provincial Parks around the corner, and Spring in full fling, we thought it a good time to show you just what these compact, powerful stoves are made of, how they work, and what advantages and disadvantages they may hold might be, in order for you to select the model just right for your style of outdoor adventuring.
The first thing to talk about are the two main categories of stove: liquid fuel and canister. Let's start with canister stoves
The biggest advantage with canisters stove are the weight of them. The micro rocket pictured above, is MSR's newest addition to their canister stove line, and it weighs in at a measly 2.6 ounces, or 73 grams. The Micro Rocket’s bigger brother and I use that term loosely here, the POCKET ROCKET weighs in at 3 ounces, or 80 grams.
These stoves are referred to as canister stoves because they run off of compressed isopropane / butane blended gas. These canisters come in several sizes and take up very little space in ones pack. The canisters come in three sizes, usually they are 4, 8, and 16 ounces. The stoves attach to the top of the canister via thread or puncture system. It should be noted that not all stoves fit on all canisters. However, in North America, most canisters you find in stores will be with threaded fixtures, which most North American stove makers build their stoves for.
A couple downfalls of canister stoves are that you can't fly with any pressurized fuel canisters, and in Europe or Africa, the canisters are either hard to find, or not compatible with your home and native stove. The other big downside is that the canisters are not refillable...yet (here’s hoping), and finding a store or station that recycles them can be tricky.
The final big downfall of the canister stove is that the canisters don't fare well in really cold temperatures and high altitudes. The stove will sputter and die out in these conditions or offer very little burn power. The lower the mercury falls, or the higher you climb into thin air, the lower the vaporization of fuel in the canister - leading to lower pressure.
If you are doing any winter camping, mountaineering, or high altitude climbing you should bring a liquid fuel stove with you.
Liquid fuel stoves are larger in size and weight, more powerful and have better temperature controls than canister stoves. You can actually simmer and cook delicate camp treats, like crepes and pizza crusts, with a little bit of practice and the right rig. These stoves also fair well up high and in the cold. These rigs also travel a lot better than canister stoves. Although clean burning camp gas, or white gas, as it is commonly referred to in North America may not be accessible the world over, some stoves can handle cruder fuels like kerosene, diesel, and even jet fuel!
I have no idea where to buy jet fuel.
With these stoves you have to store your fuel of choice in a specifically designed fuel bottle. Every stove manufacturer will have a bottle to go with their stoves, the reason you HAVE to pair these up and not mix and match is because the bottles are designed to attach securely to the stoves individual fuel pump.
The fuel pump is used to create pressure in your fuel bottle. With the canisters they come under pressure, which is why them can't go on planes. With these stoves you create the pressure. Usually it takes about a minute and 30 to 50 pumps to pressurize your bottle. Because you can control the amount of pressure in the bottle, you are able to create the size of your flame coming out of the stove, which means more refined cooking options.
Let's talk SPECS. The flagship, the mainstay, the mother of them all is the MSR Whisperlite - it hits the scale with a max weight of 13 ounces. MSR just unveiled the Whisperlite UNIVERSAL, shown above, which has weight variance due to the fact that it can be adjusted to use with a canister or liquid fuel. It's minimum weight is 9.5 ounces. Still not huge, but twice as heave as most canister rigs.
A big selling point for me with a liquid fuel stove is how stable they are. The sit much lower to the ground, have wider bases and are easier to balance full pots on. A canister stove will often have your pot sitting at least six or eight inches off the ground, compared to two or three. Many scalds and curses have been produced due to the tipping of the both.
As mentioned earlier, some liquid fuel stoves have multiple pressure control valves, allowing for precise cooking temperatures, simmering and delicacies unprocurable on a canister stove. The Dragon Fly from MSR weighs a touch more than the Whisperlite, 18 ounces max weight, 14 at its slimmest, but has unparalleled cooking control. It also has the nicest cooking surface and stability.
As with anything these days, we can go deeper and deeper into the woods on this topic, but we will leave you with that for now. You can always come in and ask any of our experts any questions you might have!
You can find all of MSR's specs and models on their webpage
If you are interested in lightweight, simple all in one coking systems, you should check out our other stove brand JETBOIL, with our favorite pick from them being the solo system, the Zip.
Thanks for reading, we will see you on the trails!
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