Canned Heat with the Solo Stove

Solo Stove's Titan

Written by Christopher Cunningham

From Issue August 2017

The stove takes some tending to keep it going, but small sticks are all that it requires.

There was a time when a campfire involved clearing the duff from a patch of ground and making a ring of stones. As pleasant as that might have been, it left a scar on the land, both in a circle of scorched earth and butchered trees, living and dead, for firewood. Charcoal tended to get scattered around good campsites, leaving its mark on clothes and camping gear. When I saw the Solo Stoves on the web they looked like a good way to enjoy the benefits of a campfire without being so hard on the natural landscape.I bought the Titan model, measuring 8″ tall and 5-1/16″ in diameter, advertised as suitable for two to four people. The Lite is the smallest model, listed as a solo backpacking stove for one or two people, but I didn’t need something so compact and could afford to carry a large stove aboard. The two larger stoves, the Campfire (9.25″ x 7″) and Bonfire (14″ x 19.5″) models, are more than I need. A lot of outdoor gear is designed with backpacking and light weight in mind, but the Solo Stove is made of stainless steel at about 1/40″ thick and is just as sturdy as the kitchen cookware that I’ve bashed about for decades.

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Comments (2)

DALLEN BOUNDS says:

August 4, 2017 at 9:45 am

Most of the camping spots that small boat operators in Puget Sound use are in State Parks, and they forbid the use of any wood found within their boundaries to be used for fires, whether it is found on the beach or in the woods. So, now I carry my own with me in my canoes; I use wood pellets. A 40-pound bag costs about $6.00, and two cups of pellets (11 ounces) used in the same-sized solo stove will burn 40 minutes and costs about 10 cents. I had to make one alteration to my Solo Stove before using the commercial pellets–I installed another screen on top of the original that had 1/4” squares to prevent the pellets from falling through.
Over the winter I cut up smaller limbs from apple, maple, and cedar trees in my yard. I cut them about 1” long, and they are drying presently. Soon I will have time to run a test burn to see how my pellets compare with the commercial products.

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Charles Taplin says:

November 12, 2022 at 10:10 pm

I am a cabinet maker and I have found that any one of the three bandsaws in our shop transforms finger-sized sticks, that you or the dog find in the woods, into wonderful firewood. As we have all found, cutting small sticks with a chainsaw is a bit dicey.

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