Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Backpack Hunting Jetboil efficiency vs weight?

I don't own a Jetboil but a couple of friends do and I have watched them use their stoves and operated them myself, out of curiosity. I own an MSR Pocket Rocket and an Optimus Crux and several other camp stoves. I usually carry one 8 ounce canister of Isobutane fuel for a 4-day/3-night trip. My friends seem to carry the same size canister. I usually use a one-quart Ti or Al pot. I store the stove and the fuel canister inside the pot, for transport.

Here's my take on the situation and I seek your input.

Advantages of Jetboil vs Pocket Rocket.
1. Fast boil time
2. Efficient use of fuel
3. Since less fuel is used, you can reduce the amount of fuel that you carry and thus reduce overall weight.

Disadvantages of Jetboil vs Pocket Rocket
1. Jetboil rig weighs a little more than a Pocket Rocket and a one-quart Ti pot.
2. Jetboil not very good at simmering a casserole or frying fish
3. Only 2 cups of water boiled at a time

Here are my questions
1. Do you actually carry less fuel? Can you get away with carrying the smaller 4 ounce canister for a 4-day/3-night trip?
2. Does the improved efficiency actually offset the additional weight of the Jetboil rig?
3. Is the quicker boil time fast enough that you have boiled another 2 cups as soon as you need more water?
4. Does the Jetboil rig take up more room in your backpack than a Pocket Rocket + 8 ounce canister stored inside a one-quart pot? Or about the same? Or less?
5. I suppose that as trip length increases, so does the benefit of improved efficiency resulting in less fuel used and therefore a reduction in weight. Is this true?

KC

I have an Optimus Crux, and would have gladly packed something twice the weight last November if it had only worked.

KC, here's my take. You are right on with your 3 advantages of the jetboil. As far as disadvantages, on your #2 the jetboil manual will tell you that it's not made to cook food in, only boil water. So advantage PR but personally, I would say the Pocket Rocket is not good at frying or simmering either. Too much like a blowtorch, especially with a thin-walled Ti pot.

I haven't timed the jetboil vs the PR and done the math but others have. I will say, the jetboil boils stuff very fast and is better in the wind.

You can store a small cannister inside the jetboil pot along with the stove, so that it's kind of a self-contained package that's a little bigger than the Ti pot. But, with my Ti pot, I can put either the Pocket Rocket or a small cannister inside, but not both. So that's a wash IMO.

For me it boils down to this (he he): On a short trip where you won't use up a small cannister with either, there's no real advantage to the JB other than stability and being better in the wind. On a longer trip where you could get away with a single cannister with the JB, but would need two with the PR, the JB wins.

I'm sure others will have different opinions though.

Best of all worlds is the discontinued JB Sol Ti, Sol Al, or a pocket rocket/Olicamp Vector with an Olicamp XTS pots. The XTS pot needs the upward-blowtorch style stove (like the Pocket Rocket) in order to achieve its lowest fuel consumption/boil time.

Have done the standard canister stoves and Ti pots.

I'll go with my Ti or Al Sol Jetboil or the Olicamp over any other canister/pot combo. BTDT.

If a guy wants a JB Ti, now's the the to get one... if I didn't alread have one I'd be all over this:

http://www.sierratradingpost.com/jetboil-sol-ti-premium-cooking-system-stove~p~8346u/?filterString=s~jetboil%2F&colorFamily=01

Jetboil has been sold to a conglomerate (Johnson Outdoors), and they've quit catering to the backpacking market and are apparently concentrating on the Cablea's crowd. Their newest stuff is heavier, and makes little sense to me.

I'd go Olicamp XTS w/ Pocket Rocket or Olicamp Vector over any of the new JB models... but others will undoubtedly disagree.

For me, on a short trip the advantage goes to an alcohol stove, maybe mixed in with wood fires or small wood stove.

I don't have a JetBoil, but I do have an MSR Reactor which is somewhat similar. It is heavy and very fuel efficient. However, when I take it, I take plenty of fuel because there is not a point otherwise. I usually take it when snow is on the ground, and I might use it for melting snow. It is lighter than carrying 32 ounces of water in a thermos by a long shot. I also take it if my trip partners need a lot of coffee (my wife) or a lot of hot meals (one of my boys)

JB for the truck, Ti for the ruck...

I like the JB, but started monkeying with a small 600Ti setup that does everything I did in the JB with less weight and bulk.







The orange silicon bowl is off a Hybrid Summit set and costs about $8 from Snow Peak. An X-mug will fit inside it if needed. For more volume and cooking ability, the 900Ti set will hold the larger Iso canister and offers the little fry pan, about a 1 steaker.

More food & folks? Then throw in the 1400Ti and a Dragon Fly. Those Ti pans aren't bad, just pay attention.



Stupid light? Go cat stove...




Warm cup of Tea? Wetfire...




So it really boils down to whatcha wanna do and how long you're going to do it.

I'm with Kevin - for long trips nothing is as efficient as a woodstove. It weighs a pound - so once you have to carry more than 2 cans of propane you might as well of brought the stove. And the woodstove is so much easier to cook on top of - slow cooked rice and beans types meals and not freeze dried (huge advantage right there).

But as regards jetboil vs pocket rocket. I go with the pocket rocket because it is so much more compact. For 1-2 night trips I often just go with the pocket rocket because I can cook with it, and boil water. It is more versatile and compact basically.

Also a good trick for cooking with titanium pots is make use of their low conductivity. You take an aluminium pot full of hot food and put it on the ground and it cools off pretty quickly. Not so with the titanium pot full of food. It holds the heat because it does not conduct the heat away. This is also why water heats so much quicker with an aluminium pot.

So when i cook with a Titanium pot I get it boiling and then take it off the burner and every 10 minutes or so give a quick re heat. I find titanium is BETTER for cooking rice and beans type meals, but admittedly it is worse for quick boiling water.

Patrick

This thread got me rooting around through 40 years worth of stoves and paraphernalia! A happy diversion from paperwork.

Some old favorites are gone, the Gerry/Hank Roberts is long lost, a 1980's MSR XGK and the poorly named MSR "Simmerlite" to name a couple more, but I've still got my Svea 123 I bought at REI in 1975. That thing is still the best all-around stove I've ever used!



My current favorite remains the Sol Ti... 9.5 oz's.

The Olicamp XTS and Vector Stove (with mesh carrying bag) are 11 oz's. THIS IS A BEST BUY... got them both together for $35. Even at full retail it's a bargain, and would be what I'd chose over any of the current Jetboil offerings. I think.

The same Olicamp Vector and Montbell Trek Ti pot (16 oz size) are 9.4 oz's including nylon carrying bag.

Jetboil Sol AL is 11.1 oz's.

**ADD 7.4 oz's to above weights for a single 100g fuel canister.**

At the end of the day, a Sol Ti or Olicamp XTS with their unique heat ring trumps lighter Ti pot/stove combos because they're so incredibly miserly with fuel and perform better in the wind.

I never worry about running out of fuel on a 5 day trip with either... not something I'd be so confident of with another similarly sized canister stove.

They are however strictly "boil only" propositions.

For the best all-around, 4 season simmering/cooking stove, it's tough to beat an MSR Dragonfly.

But an asbestos flame spreader ala bunsnen burner can help a lot of stoves like the pictured Whisperlite Int'l and Svea 123. I've got one around here somewhere...

Check out this old dog, called a "TaKit". I think the boil time is "eventually"

Ah yes, the glorious TayKit stove. 1940's contraption iirc.

Another beauty I had at one time was a Russian knock-off of the Primus no. 1. Friend got it in East Germany in the 1980's... it eventually went on ebay for too much money!

Stoves are fun...

T in A:

Was it cold when your Crux didn't work? I ask because isobutene performs poorly at low temps. My Crux has always performed flawlessly in warm to moderate temps but performance decreases at subfreezing temps. So I use other fuel types when temps are below freezing.

On two separate occasions, when isobutene stoves didn't operate properly, I discovered a small spider web egg sack inside the stoves. Once the spider web was removed, the stoves performed properly.

KC

You have to love the Jetboil reviews from people who don't own one.

Exactly what I was thinking... been using various ones for 9 years.

What the heck do I know...

My collection of backpacking stoves looks a lot like yours. I just counted and there are nine stoves and too many pots, pans, fuel bottles, grills, cups, bowls, etc., to bother counting. But I don't own a Jetboil. Maybe I should buy one just to add to the collection.

The only camp stove that I've ever discarded was a brand "X" stove that I bought in Yellow Front in Phoenix in 1977. It was very simple with a fixed pot stand surrounding the burner/valve assembly, which screwed directly onto the top of the butane canister. It was super lightweight, and super simple and I used that little stove a lot but eventually one of the pot stand connectors broke and I threw it out.

I disagree slightly regarding the SVEA 123. I own one and it's so beautiful that I will never get rid of it. When the brass is polished it's the most elegant stove that I've ever seen. It weighs less than an MSR Whisperlite + fuel bottle/pump because the SVEA fuel tank is smaller and it's attached on the bottom of the stove.

But other stoves perform better. I once tried to operate the SVEA stove while sitting directly on snow. Had to actually start a little campfire and set the stove directly on the fire the get the fuel to atomize. It probably would have worked fine if I had just set it on some sticks to begin with instead of setting it directly on snow. Oh well, live and learn. I own one of those after-market pumps and that improves startup without priming. But the ugly little aluminum pump looks like a tumor on the side of the beautiful polished brass stove.

I agree that my Dragonfly is the best simmering stove that I own.

I still have my old XGK and have updated it with the newer style of pot holder wires. But I never use it.

KC

Brad & brymoore:

My analysis is not a review, it is a collection of guesses and I'm asking if my guesses are correct. Seems like some but not all of them, are. The main thing that I was interested in learning is do you save enough fuel to justify the extra weight of a Jetboil. Seems like you might on longer trips but the jury is still out regarding shorter trips.

KC

Re brymoore's comment on jetboil reviewers - I did own a jetboil. And I gave it to my hunting partner for his birthday - so occasionally I still get to see it in use.

Even my hunting partner has pretty much stopped carrying it into the field. It is GREAT at what it does. But it is bulky and all it does is boil water. So if you want efficient water boiling it is probably what you want. But it is bulky and if you want to actually cook . ... . Then you probably want something else.

Patrick

It was about 22 when my Optimus failed. I shouldn't say failed, it boiled water in about half an hour. Maybe 45 mins. That's after I kept the 'cold weather' fuel can in my bag all night.

My hunting camp needs are simple -- I want boiling water fast. Don't need to simmer, not too worried about weight. But I don't want to get up an hour earlier and then fight with a stove.

Evidently nobody has compared the Minimo to the Flash, hence my other post on the forum.

I have all the itty-bitty stoves but all I use now is the JB Ti SUMO. It takes up a fair amount of space but I have room to spare. One of the biggest advantages of it is it boils a lot of water, very fast, and once that water is used up, I can put the stove away.

Also, I can grab the pot when it is piping hot. I don't need a rag, or a glove or a set of channel locks. I just grab the fuggin' pot and pour.

Love the Jetboil. Wish I bought one right out of the gate.



Travis

My friend's Jetboil amazes me. But I have not seem it work sub-freezing.

They work fine below freezing.




Travis