Save a Penny, Make a Stove
Since I started backpacking in the mid-1970s I have accumulated a collection of backpacking stoves that don’t work. All were expensive, heavy and prone to quit whenever a hot drink or food would have been very much appreciated.
Several years ago, my friend, Dr. Jim Grenfell, and I started looking for a way to make a simple, reliable backpacking stove. The following story shows one solution by making an alcohol stove out of soda or beer cans.
The scouts of Troop 18 in Bend, Oregon, use similar beverage can stoves on most of our backpacking trips. The guys boil water, of course, but have also made bacon and eggs, fried fish and done all sorts of cooking with the stoves.
I ran into a through hiker on the Pacific Crest Trail last summer. She had used the same aluminum can stove since she left Mexico several months earlier. That same stove was also used when she hiked the entire Appalachian Trail the year before.
I carry a sideburner aluminum can stove, with about six ounces of alcohol, in my daypack. It can be used to boil water if necessary, and weighs well under an ounce without fuel. Since I got the alcohol stove, I never use anything else in the backcountry!
Read stove for more information.
