Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Backpack Hunting Super Ultra Light Wood Stoves

For the past few months, I've been playing with a few different stove ideas to get lighter and multi-function. I think I'm finally getting pretty close. Essentially these are UL Sibley style stoves. There is no bottom, but the smaller one works with a stainless pan. You can't cook and heat on them at the same time, but you can cook or heat with them.

I do believe, that these are the lightest stoves period. The medium size one, weighs a scant 2.65 ounces, and the larger one, which is 15 inches tall weighs 4.5 ounces. With a damper, and pipe , you still can be under one pound. Thus far, I've been really pleased with the last two. The first one I made last summer, I ditched and thought the idea was horrible, but after circling around, and changing the profile and door, I think it works well. Not as well as a big box, but well and great for when you might want some heat, and it cooks very well as well.

Below is the large one, I haven't spent much time calculating size, but my guess is 700 cubic inches.



Currently, I plan on taking it out and doing a fair amount of testing. Perhaps we produce something at some point, or perhaps i just have a lightweight utility stove for wandering in the woods. I'm curious to hear your feedback. Perhaps after refining a bit more, if it's something we want to pursue, maybe we will put out a tester.

Thanks

QUITE interested!

How do you use it to cook, Kevin?

Maybe I'm missing the obvious, but how do you cook on it? Have you tried it in any sort of wind? looks like pipe movement could lift the bottom a bit.

Good questions,

The damper is a little special and doubles as a cooking platform essentially.

I have not tried wind, admittedly I need to tighten up the damper a bit, there are some things to do there.

It has hold downs for keeping it stable.

Maybe I'll just leave the stove stuff to you! I was playing with the same idea, but never got so far as a prototype. Couldn't quite come with a cooking method I liked the idea of. Looking forward to seeing how this turns out.

very interested! make us prototypes so we can help test!

This is a fun discussion of stove building:
http://zombiehunters.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=26369

The Sibley stove pops up a couple times. Here's a picture of the original:

Yeah, what he said!

Awesome. I was just thinking it would be neat to use a kelly kettle with a chimney pipe but haven't figured out what to do with the fire once the water was boiling. Shape looks very similar to your design.

This looks so sweet, I am very interested in this.

Thanks I will post some more photos shortly as I refine a couple things.

Here is how I envision using it. You can use the stove base on it's own, for cooking or use the base + pipe for heating. If I was day hunting, I might grab the base and take it with me, if I wanted midday tea or something I would light a little fire and heat some water. Although I love wood stove, in mild weather I don't always want to carry them. By integrating the cooking , and the stove and getting it to around a pound with pipe, it becomes much more palatable when the weather is good, since the stove base doesn't weigh much more than an alcohol stove with some fuel.

That being said, how would you guys use it ? Would you mostly want to heat water ? If it was adapted for use with stainless bottles would that be attractive ?

Thanks
Kevin

Don't ask me how I would use cool schit before I have it. I just know I want it, and I'd use it.

Yeah, an adaptation integral for using a stainless bottle would simplify heating water, that's for sure.

What I'm envisioning is using it to heat with, and heat water as a secondary, with an alcohol stove or one of those micro-rockets as "cook stove" set-up.

Can you show it in "cook mode"? I'm having a hard time seeing how you'd cook with it and not fill your tent with smoke.

You would not cook in your tent usually, perhaps a little I have a couple ideas on that, but currently you would cook outside as any wood cook stove that is not fully contained

I see said my blind eye. Gotcha.

Kevin,
I very rarely cook on my box stoves, mostly because when I get back to the tent at night, I want hot water "now" to start my dinner. I just use my pocket rocket to get dinner going and the stove to warm up and dry out. Wonder how much a weight a light plate for the bottom would add? Would make ash removal much easier, and would be safer by not having smoldering ashes on the ground.

Good point SpenceG

The smaller one was sized to use a 8" stainless burner cover on the bottom if desired. The bigger one is close to using a 10" burner cover, and I'll modify an upcoming one to be that size. The burner covers are available at target for $15.00 I think.

I have not weighed them.

I would be using this for heating my shelter and cooking would be secondary.

My may concerns is that it doesn't blow around with wind, it can be fed easily, and the design allows the "box" to be filled with wood. Obviously lightweight and packability are main concerns but i think you got that covered.

I am like the others. I am interested in the heat. For cooking I keep it simple with a 3oz stove just to heat water. I am very interested in a quick easy setup, and something that is not bulky to carry. A long burn time is of interest, but that probably is more of a product of what kind of wood is being used (hardwoods vs softwoods).

Is this something that can be a DIY project fairly easy with no special tools required?