Gear

Right looking for a new stove, had enough of the jetbiol, its a bit on the heavy side, the personal cooking system is too tall and narrow for cooking food, and the pan is too big and cumbersome for drinks (and did I mention both are heavy).

I am thinking of getting a "MSR Whisperlite Multi Fuel Stove" but not sure of the whole multi fuel thing. At the moment most of my travelling is in Europe, and likely to stay that way for this year at least, but next year hoping to set my sights on more distant lands.

1. So can the above stove be hooked up to a gas canister, or is it just multi liquid fuels?
2. am i better having a gas stove for use in Europe, or will using other fuels revolutionise my experience?
3. How reliable and easy/hard to service and maintain are these stoves?

Also looking for a large titanium cup/pot type thing, big enough to cook a dehydrated packet meal in, and still suitable for using as a drinking utensil if anyone has recommendations for one.

thanks

1) no

2) MSR whisper int'l ROCKS!!

3) very easy!

have had mine for 15 years and NOTHING has ever broken (knock on wood). it always works when i need it and have had it in temps ranging from +40 down to -30.

have had it run continuous for hours when melting snow and no issues at all.

the only thing i replaced after 12 years was the wind shield thing.

the multifuel is great although white gas burns the cleanest which is more widely available in western countries in my experience. if u travel to africa, asia etc, you can easily and very cheapily burn petrol or gasoline.

this stove rocks and it just keeps on rocking. have never heard anyone complain about it...ever.

Primus have a few multi-fuel stoves too some can run on LPG. You either use it with a metal bottle and the pressure pump or leave the pump and attache to the can.

I think Optimus do a stove for LPG and liquid mult-fuels too.

MY preference would be for a remote canister LPG stove such as the 198g express spider that has come out recently.

Go-gas used to do a multi-fuel too one model was LPG as well. They also have come out with a vvv light remote can LPG stove that is lighter than even the new primus one.

MSR is a respected brand but the other models are supposed to be better than the whisperlite due to a slightly better hose system - less clogging with dirty fuel.

I have a Primus MFS (predecessor of the Omnifuel) and it does work on gas.  But it doesn't work as well on gas as a dedicated gas stove because the spreader is much less sophisticated.  It's noisier, doesn't spread the flame so well and I suspect is less efficient.

I take it with me if I suspect fuel resupply might be hard.  So for a week paddling around Shetland with only odd contact with small villages it was ideal, but anywhere where I'll be taking all my own fuel or resupply will be reliable enough (and that is actually most backpacking/cycle-touring situations) I'll just go for pure gas, most often with a remote cannister stove as they're nicer for cooking than a sit-on-top (we have a Primus Gravity EF).

On to liquid fuel in general, they're very relaible if they're maintained properly and the amount of maintenance depends on the fuel: coleman fuel, very little, unleaded petrol, potentially quite a bit.  I suspect that a lot of their popularity has historically been a bit like having a Quasar for car-camping: it's top expedition gear, so it must be the best!

Pete.

i'd say kerosine burns not as dirty as petrol but not as clean as white gas, so sort of in the middle.

u also have to change the knob where the fuel comes out if u use kerosine. its not hard at all to do on the MSR Whis... but i can't b arsed so i almost always use white gas first, then petrol if needed.

Not me mate, we use Kerosene at work for the burners in the furnaces. It replaced red diesel as the fuel back when kero was a lot cheaper than diesel. Its sold as kerosene to industry in the UK. Parafin is the stuff as sold to domestic use over here for parafin burners for heating in the dim and distant past. Could be a case of Kerosene is the modern name for it and parafin is the old name.

Anyway, all I know is it flows a lot easier through any gaps in the feeder pipes to the furnace. The joints and the like that takes it from the outside tank to the burner with its numerous turns and joints were a nightmare to stop the leaks when they switched over from diesel apparently. Even now it still leaks in places hence the free source of kerosene! Besides that we often have to take a sample from the tank, a necessary quality check!

Coleman Fuel/white gas is "pure" petrol, without additives and burns cleanly. In the old days vehicle petrol had lead added to it to stop it pre-ignighting while being compressed in vehicle engines. When burnt at the lower temperatures and pressures of stoves this lead left a nasty coating in the generator tubes meaning the stoves were best cleaned after every use. So unleaded petrol has solved this by removing the lead which caused the problems....WRONG! The lead has just been replaced with other additives which are less harmful when breathed by humans, but more harmful to stoves.

So.....the Whisperlite Internationale comes with a cleaning kit which allows you to remove the wire, or jiggle it up and down in the tube to dislodge the muck. This is generally completely unnecessary when burning white gas, or any specialist stove fuel, but must be done every time you use vehicle fuel. Do that and the stove will last for ever! Incidentally apparently it also helps to pump it up and give the stove a good blast at full power before turning off - the additives apparently don't stick as much inside the generator tube when its glowing red hot and the fuel is blasting through under high pressure!

Decided to go for a gas stove for now and look at multi fuel options at a later date.

Decided to go for a gas stove for now and look at multi fuel options at a later date.

Nice thing about doing it this way is the plain gas stove will never be redundant, even if you get a MF that does gas (a pure gas stove works better on gas and is lighter to carry).

Next choice is uber-light cannister top or remote cannister...  I have both, take the can-top if I'm saving grammes, take the remote can when I want to do Actual Cooking and/or cook with a minimum of faff once I'm set up in camp. 

Pete.

I have gone for an msr windpro, saw it for a good price 70 quid including postage to Germany, They are going for 95 euros plus postage over here.

Now if only the pound would collapse further I might be able to afford the tent I want.

I'm running my Whisperlites (I have two; they replaced a two burner plus grill setup) on Aspen 4T from my local chainsaw workshop. It's much cleaner than unleaded petrol: the stoves prime more quickly and burn with less soot buildup.

My experiment with red Diesel is best forgotten!