Short solo trip = alcohol

More than a few days or used as a group stove = Jetboil


Personally, I choose my Jetboil Sol Ti everytime. I just had too many mishaps with alcohol. Got a nasty burn once and another time had a bottle of fuel leak in my pack. It was contained for the most part, but I had no fuel. FOR ME, alcohol was great in theory, but not in practice.

Brad Fisher: As I get older and more experienced I have started factoring in ease of use and simplicty into my evaluation process. Not all about the weight

Alcohol Stove vs Jetboil Sol Ti - weight savings, is it worth it? Yes.

Getting back on track, it sort of depends on the hiker. If you are in a group, simply require every person to bring their own stove, pot and windscreen. For 5oz, this is an easy carry. For 2 people, it is possible to split the weight of a Jetboil among both or even three people. For larger groups, every 2-3 people will need another stove up to the maximum trail sized group.

I think the weight issue has been pretty much resolved, because the discusion has moved to other things that need to be factored in. Light weight packing is not ALL about weight, something we often fail to consider.

Anyway, alcohol is usually the lightest up to ten days. For longer times out, you may need to perform your own calculations, because at ten days the difference between Alcohol, canisters, esbit and WG start looking different enough at the start and finish to become less important and more about the type of hike you are taking. That is early mountain climbs, or, later mountain climbs? Canoing then hiking, or, hiking then canoing? Even at ten days this has a pretty drastic influance on when you want the weight to change fastest. As Dan said, you can sort of choose when to carry less, even if it means a bit more to start with.

In every case up to ten days, alcohol is always the lightest weight for average carry weight...even out to 12 days, the most I bothered to check this time through. It also has the highest starting weight for ten days. (I use about 3oz/day average over ten days. Some will use less. 4 cups of water in the morning, 4 cups at night, including 15min simmer for cooking.) For short trips(2-4days) alcohol is always a bit lighter than the Jetboil. Duration does matter, but it is far less important than other things at ten days.

An example: Canisters are within 4oz at 12 days, average. But you need to carry about 1.75 pounds of food per day for twelve days. Or, about 20 pounds. I do not think 4 oz is all that noticable in a 32 pound pack weight. So, I am kind'a going out on a limb, and I will simply call them fairly equivalent at that range. (Water is not included, it always needs to be present.)

Volume and usability become more important than raw weight for durations of a week or more.

For me, overall volume is very important. I use the smaller 2200ci Murmur for up to 10 days. And the obsolete MiniPosa for up to 15 days. The compact SVEA and a 12oz bottle of fuel will last 12 days, a 16oz bottle is more than enough for 15days. I will note that WG only weighs .8oz per floz. Alcohol is slightly heavier, but only by a couple hundredths of an ounce. Canister gas *used* to be 4oz but I believe it is only about 3.88, nowdays. The volume of fuel and containers gets pretty high at 10 days. The SVEA and a 12oz bottle is about the smallest. Canisters are all about the same as alcohol requiring *about* the same volume as a 32oz bottle. 3-4oz canisters(or one 8oz can and one 4oz can) is lighter than a 32oz bottle of alcohol, though. But, you always carry the canisters. With a small plastic bottle, I can reduce volume as I go, but this is not important on the trail. Only the starting volume is considered. Your pack volume does not increase after that. COnsidering *just* volume for ten days out, I will bring the SVEA, as I do.

Usability can get devided into several categories: temperature, group size, blustery conditions found at altitude, personal preference, difficulty of use (setup, knock down chores,) durability, reliability, legal requirements. Probably some others I missed (off the top of my head.) Personal preference has a lot of factors to consider, alone. As an example: some value the "turn the knob and press the button" feature of a jetboil. Some don't mind the extra fiddling of measuring fuel, setting up a cone, and lighting an alcohol stove. Or, like me, filling, priming, and lighting a WG stove. Or, the fussing needed to get an Esbit tab out of the wrapper, setting up the stove and, especially, lighting the tab. There is no way to evaluate these factors, generally.

There is more to think about than raw weight when you do UL backpacking. So, I cannot say that any weight savings is worth it in combination with all else that is specific to your needs for your trip. What I will say is to evaluate all components before trying to answer your own question. To do that, you need a lot more information than a weight comparison. Asking is it worth it in this group is like putting a mouse on a cats paw and wondering if he will grab it. Light weight is ALWAYS worth it...

I'll acknowledge that both alky and canister stoves have a place, as several people have already mentioned. But for day to day use I just like playing around with alky stoves. They are brutally simple, no valves, no o-rings, non-pressurized fuel, etc.

Also, the JetBoil Sol Ti is ONE product, and one with issues. (Most canister stoves/pots are heavier.) Have there been any more reports of people melting the fins off?

Edited by acrosome on 07/17/2012 08:20:24 MDT.

"Also, the JetBoil Sol Ti is ONE product, and one with issues. (Most canister stoves/pots are heavier.) Have there been any more reports of people melting the fins off?"


How many people have really had issues with that? There was a post by Hikin' Jim who posted on multiple sites about it, but I haven't really seen it elsewhere.

While I am aware of the intent of the op in comparing the Jetboil with alcohol stoves it needs to be remembered that there are much lighter gas options than the Jetboil. My one person setup weighs in at 250g (8.8oz)(Monatauk Gnat, cozy, windshield and 550ml pot plus the dead weight of a 100g canister) giving a dead weight saving of 130g (33%) over the Jetboil with relatively close fuel performance. Adding a bigger pot still only adds 25-35g (approx 1oz).

I agree that for 2-3 days alcohol will be lighter but I side with the ease of use crowd and I have sufficient fuel if I decide I want more hot drinks than I planned for.

A solution to the stack of part used canisters is to carry two part used ones on easy trips - only a weight penalty of 90g for 100g capacity canisters.

Yes, well aware of that. I used a 3oz number for the canister stove in my calculations. I believe my Coleman F1 was very light at 2.5oz (I shaved it down a bit.) Others range from about 2.5-7oz or so. Jet boils, sans cup weigh about 5oz depending...)

+1 to dan's post. You want to compare the average daily carry weight. The issue with the JetBoil is that unless your cooking needs are perfectly aligned with the fuel in a single canister, you end up having to carry the dead weight of a first canister when you are into the second and/or extra fuel. For my style (two small boils / day for 1 person) alcohol, or esbits (which is what I use now) stay consistently lighter than JetBoil.

As Jim pointed out, weight isn't the only factor. Another issue is the compactness of the system. My entire system (including esbits fuel for up to 12 days) fits inside my MLD 850ml pot/mug. Most likely alcohol wouldn't be quite so compact, but it would be pretty good. I have not had a problem with wind or rain when using the Caldera Cone ULC.

I switch to a iso butane stove when I a cooking for a number of people or if I have to melt snow for water because achohol and esbits don't run hot enough to manage these tasks efficiently.

--Mark