Whitebox Stove

March 16, 2008 by Darren
Filed under: Blog, Walking the dogs 

After the last two days being surrounded by people at the NEC, I wanted peace and quiet. Preferably as few people as possible where-ever I was going to walk the dogs. Looking out of the window and seeing rain, I knew I would get that solitude required with the mutts.

As I was getting my gear together to take a long to make a brew, I was thinking of where best to go that would provide shelter from the elements.

I choose a particularly forested walk that would provide some cover from the rain and wind, but also offer plenty of places to stop and brew up.

Yes, you all know which stove I took with me today. It was the Whitebox stove. For all those that saw the celebrations in Cardiff when the trophy was presented to the Welsh Rugby team, those jet of flames where nothing compared to the flame off this little beauty (see photo below on the right).

If you look over on the Backpackinglight.co.uk website for this stove (see link above) Bob says the following about the Ti-Lite mug and the Whitebox stove,”the Vargo pot is the smallest diameter I would use on this cooker“. But I had conflicting advice on the day it was delivered from Bob. So I went with the delivery advice and took with me the wider Snow Peak (this came with the Caldera Cone I won from Roman). As you can see from the photo below on the left, even then this was not wide enough, and had flames going up the sides. Which meant a hot handle when it came time to pour the boiling water out into a mug. But I’m not going to hold this against the stove I’ve had this with more than one of the stoves in this mini round up.

I did think that the stove seemed a bit unstable with the pot on top of it. You wouldn’t want to use this on anything but flat ground.

I used 2 fl oz of meths to boil about a mug and a half of water which it did pretty quickly. The windshield provided with it did it’s job, but I could see in more fierce weather needing a taller windshield.

I’d like to try this again with 1 fl oz of fuel, because if I can boil enough for a cuppa with that, it is easily comparable to the Caldera Cone for fuel efficiency.

Ok I’m not Ray Mears, and initially tried lighting the stove with a Starflint Firestarter. Which I couldn’t do, but then again I’ve not yet managed to light a meths stove with one yet. So that is a me thing I think, and not a design of the stove thing. I quickly went back to matches and the stove lit quickly. But remember if using for the first time, that once the meths has caught fire, there is a small delay before the stove gets into cremate the living mode, and you are then able to put you pot onto it.

The stove seemed to cool to a temperature it can be handled very quickly.

On the product page is also this handy little hint:

“During the podcast interview I did with Bill, he explains that he uses very little meths to bring the liquid to the boil, then removes the pan, adds the dried food and places inside a pot cosy for 10-15 minutes, for the perfect hot meal.“

Note:You can listen to that podcast here (you will need to scroll down to find it, whilst there why not listen to the podcast starring Duncan if you haven’t heard it. That one is called “Getting back out on the hills”).

But remember this does not only apply to meths stoves, but all stoves.

Ok back on topic, I enjoyed using this stove. Could see myself using more if I could solve the stability side of things with the wider pots.

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Comments

12 Comments on Whitebox Stove

  1. john hee on Sun, 16th Mar 2008 5:22 pm

    2. “You wouldn’t want to use this on anything but flat ground”
    And that is going to be a real problem I’d guess -any steadying tripods around for these designs yet?

  2. Dawn on Sun, 16th Mar 2008 6:55 pm

    3. Yes, that is a problem I have also found, both with the white box and a few other alchohol stoves. Bringing the water to the boil and then making use of a pot cosy is a method I use regularly. Fuel economy is so important when you are out for several days.

  3. Dawn on Sun, 16th Mar 2008 6:57 pm

    4. By the by Darren, your pots look so nice and shiny. Mine are blackened and show signs of use and abuse.

  4. Darren on Sun, 16th Mar 2008 8:22 pm

    5. John, none that I have come across yet. But that is not to say that some enterprising person in the US hasn’t done one. Let’s face it the market and use of meths stoves is soooo much larger over there.

    Dawn, well they should do as you know the Ti-Lite was bought last month specifically for use with the Peak Ignition. Whilst the Snow Peak also new was won in a competition. Up until this testing I’ve been using a Jetboil for all my backpacking needs.

  5. Darren on Sun, 16th Mar 2008 9:50 pm

    6. And the sad question is do I get a new model and compare that to this one?
    Now that would be sad. I’ll have to see how much spare cash I have after the TGOC.

  6. Andy Howell on Sun, 16th Mar 2008 10:03 pm

    7. I wonder – just how many stoves does a man need :-)

    I have 6 at the moment!

  7. Duncan/AktoMan on Sun, 16th Mar 2008 11:46 pm

    8. I think I’m on 5. Three gas ones, one meths and one hexamine. Any purchase of a wood burning stove by me would just be for novelty value as I can’t see myself using it in the places where I hike.

  8. Darren on Mon, 17th Mar 2008 6:52 am

    9. When I spoke to Duncan I think I counted about 8 stoves at the moment. But then I the impression is that I think Bob could blow that number away.

    I don’t see many more stove reviews happening unless I somehow win the lottery. What I’ll probably do is try and add a long term usage element to them at some point.

    But I do hope people have found the way I have reviewed them useful.

  9. Dawn on Mon, 17th Mar 2008 9:14 am

    10. By the way, one drawback with alchohol stoves, they burn on meths. in the UK meths have additives, one down side of this is that they tend to gum up the jet holes of stoves. Something I found out using a brasslite over the period of a week. Another factor is that meths can deposit a lot of sooty material on your pots and from there to fingers. One fuel I have found that burns cleaner is surgical spirit. It is a fiercer fuel though.

  10. Weird Darren on Mon, 17th Mar 2008 9:31 am

    11. Dawn,
    thanks for the tip. I might have to put up a tips page on the blog for stoves.

  11. Martin Banfield on Tue, 18th Mar 2008 9:11 pm

    12. Hey Darren
    Good to see you at the weekend.
    Don’t worry about your stove count; I’m not a gear freak like you but I can easily tot up 8 stoves hidden away around the house. Some work better than others! A bit like the compasses, of which I have 3 (for back-up you know); now you would of (sic) thought a compass to be a fairly standard piece of kit, but these 3 lovelies give me a thrilling choice of routes, as the needles all point in different directions.

  12. Darren on Tue, 18th Mar 2008 10:12 pm

    13. Martin,
    it was good to meet again, and to finally meet the DP as well.
    Stove number 9 is on it’s way. Oops cats out of the bag now.

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