One of the best gifts I ever got when I was travelling was this, which is a stove made
out of a simple drinks can, so in this video what we're going to do is learn how to make
it with a little bit of help from my friend Armin and about 10 minutes of your time.
Well we're going to be making some alcohol stoves and there's many different kinds of
alcohol stoves, but I found that this design would be the best for travelling and specifically
for boiling.
Very efficient with fuel and very easy to make, just one can, pocket knife and if you
have a pair of scissors it'll be a cleaner job.
This is a nice pocket knife.
Just that as you cut, you cut the top off, kind of wiggle it in, okay, so you hold it
quite firmly and you just slowly work your way around.
There's an easy mistake to make at this point doing the initial cutting, which I made the
first time I was trying to make it, so this is how to do it properly.
Instead of cutting at this lower ridge, you cut along this top part here where the aluminum
is very rigid and supported by this fold here, and what you find is that it will cut much
more easily, it won't be bending and crimping the aluminum as you're cutting, very cleanly,
there it is, nice, and you can use the leftover top to play tiddlywinks, sure of course, well,
also you don't need a big can, you can do this with a small can, this is just what we
had to drink today.
Next step, very simple, is to just cut it in half, so you can make your stove as big
as you want, the bigger you make it, the more fuel you'll have, but I found the optimum
size to be just about this big here, okay, it's pretty even, now the size of the bottom
will determine the size of the top, so what you want is it to come right there, so you
want to cut that can right about right there, see how that goes, alright, so it will come
about right there, that's just fine, so what you do is you take two fingers, place it underneath,
and then you just dent, slightly dent, and a tiny dent up top right there, just a bit
into the ridge, small dent here, bigger dent on the bottom, you don't want a big dent on
the top, just come over one finger space, you do it again, you do this all the way around,
and essentially you're creating these pockets for your alcohol fuel to fill with vapor,
and these are your little combustion chambers, you can say, of the stove, there you go, creates
a pattern like that, when that is finished, you take your bottom piece, and it should
just slide right into place, and there's just one more little thing you have to do, and
your stove is complete, you have to make a little hole, you can do it with a thumbtack,
with anything really, place your finger behind there, and I wouldn't apply much pressure,
you just want to move it, at this phase you might push too hard and punch right through
and make a big hole, a big gash through your can, you really just move it back and forth,
you don't really put a lot of pressure, until you feel it with your index finger on the
other side, you feel that you've came through, and it doesn't have to be very big, just a
little hole like that, maybe we light them up.
So the stove runs on pure alcohol, which you'll find in pharmacies in most countries, you
might find it under the name rubbing alcohol, or medical alcohol, or possibly surgical spirit.
This is 96% medical alcohol, bought at your pharmacy for 50 cents, so it really doesn't
take very much, we're just going to fill a little bit, of course if you're cooking,
you intend to cook something like a big meal, or rice, or beans and such, you'd fill it
a bit more, here we go, round it itself, two cups of tea in there, oh yeah, that's a big
jasmine, that's a big pot of beans, enough for a hearty meal, just have five minutes,
then five minutes, maybe five and a half.
Very important things to know, how to turn the stove off, and how to store it so it doesn't
get damaged.
So you can't just blow the flame out, it'll just burn harder, you have to smother the
flame, so we're just going to smother it with this plastic container, it cools very fast,
you can touch it within a few seconds, you see there's quite a lot of fuel in there,
so what you do is you just slide the top off, if you want to remove the fuel, and you just
take this and pour your fuel right back into your container, there you go, and you're ready
to store your stove, you can put it right in here, there's your self-contained little
kitchen, a light weight, it's for free, all of this is recycled material, that's magic.
So that's all there is to it, the best gift I have received on the road, needless to say
we are working with fire, so all the usual safety precautions should apply, and I hope
you enjoy using it.
