While walking through wally world I found a good aluminum bottle to make a stove out of. It is an energy drink called Thinq. So I bought two and whipped up this stove this morning.
The stove has 17 1/16" jets. It is held together with rivets because I'm kind of impatient and didn't want to wait for JB Weld to dry.
This stove is kind of rough partially because of my lack of patients and the fact I have a broken middle finger on my left hand from a mountain biking accident. The pins come out in two weeks though. One trial burn just to see how it bloomed. Bloomed in about 30-45 seconds, and boiled 2+ cups of water in about 4 min. in a imusa grease saver pot bottom width about 5". After the second stove is built I'll take some detailed measurements of performance.

Edited spelling

Edited by BurningDaylight on 11/11/2011 11:08:22 MST.

Nice work Eric. I like the bottle. Have you seen any of the TEAM Realtree Energy drink bottles at your Wallyworld? I was trying to find some for the same kind of stove but the thing may work just as well or better.

I understand the rivets in lieu of epoxy.

Have you considered "nothing" to join the pieces? I've always just press-fit the two pieces together, and I have never had a problem with them leaking or slipping apart.

For that, I do not push the inner piece inside the outer piece and then keep pushing. Instead I invert the inner piece on a block and then put the outer piece over/around it. With a second block over the outer piece, I then hammer the whole works together. It works for me.

--B.G.--

Brent,
I just posted about the realltree bottles a couple of days ago. I don't know about Wally world, but the Realtree bottles are at every gas station in my area. If you can't find one, let me know and I'll help you out.

Erik:

If you have time, can you show a picture looking into the stove from above?

Thanks,

HJ
Adventures in Stoving

Brent,
I really like the size of the bottle I found it is smaller than the bud lite bottles, miller lite bottles, and larger than the white box and gram weenie. I made a stove out of a bottle just like the miller bottles, it worked well but the flame spread was a little wide for me.
Bob,
The shoulder of this type of bottle is too gradual I think for only a friction fit.
HJ,
Here is the view you are looking for.

edited spelling finger splint hit random numbers.

Edited by BurningDaylight on 11/11/2011 21:19:47 MST.

I am currently using crown next denatured alcohol as fuel, and i went a little over board with the food coloring.

Thanks. Looks pretty nice! About how wide of a flame is it? I don't suppose (pushing my luck here) you have a flame shot with a pot? I'm looking for something to use with a relatively narrow pot where I won't get a lot of flame spillage up the side.

HJ
Adventures in Stoving

HJ, you might need to start with a much narrower bottle in order to get a narrower flame.

I start with an aluminum bottle that is 1.5" in diameter with a capacity of 100ml.

By deciding where to cut it in the middle, you can get more or less alcohol capacity inside, but the taller it is, the less stable it will be for the narrow pot. That's why there might be sense in starting with the wider bottle, if stability is an issue.

--B.G.--

HJ,
Ask and ye shall receive. That picture was with the water close to boiling so everything was good and warmed up for max flame spread. For a pot small than 4" diameter I would think a smaller diameter stove would be better.
edited image didn't post

Edited by BurningDaylight on 11/12/2011 07:19:47 MST.

Thank you, Erik!

Yeah, looks like you're still getting a little flame spillage. Not trying to be critical! Looks like a good stove. I'm just thinking out loud here as to how to reduce flame spillage which has been my nemesis on this type of stove for a while.

I wonder if smaller jets? fewer jets? lower jets? would reduce flame spillage. or maybe a slightly larger diameter can could be used as a sleeve (just thinking out loud here) to channel the flames?

HJ
Adventures in Stoving

"smaller jets? fewer jets?"

HJ, smaller and fewer jets will produce more back pressure in the vapor chamber. Increased pressure may have the effect of forcing the horizontal flames out farther. However, really small jets won't be able to carry that pressure far. That's why, if you look at existing stove designs, they tend to have similar jet sizes.

Now, if you make more and more jet holes, that should have the effect of lowering the pressure. That may make the horizontal flames shoot out and then head upward. That may be a good thing for flame pattern, but it may decrease the overall efficiency of the rig.

You might want to investigate changing the pot height above the burner.

After fighting these decisions for a while, I turned around and went the other way. I purchased a tiny tea kettle that is very short and squat and weighs 2.6 oz. It does fine on my alcohol burners.

--B.G.--

Bob,

Yeah, maybe I'm questing after something that doesn't exist. Your solution (just get a wide, stubby pot) sounds a lot better.

Thanks,

HJ
Adventures in Stoving

I've made a few of these recently and had the same issue with the flame fanning out past the pot some. What I did is angled my jets upwards by drilling down at an angle. I use a pin vise instead of a drill to do this. It takes longer but is much easier to control. This stove is still suited for larger pots, but the angled jets helped some.

Sean,

That sounds very interesting. Do you have any photos of the stove in use?

HJ
Adventures in Stoving