Kpot...and Alcohol Stove

Intro: Kpot...and Alcohol Stove

Well, often I was in mountains, backpacking photo gear, and dry one day food. And, waiting to take a shot, I wanted to have a hot cup of tea.
So, I collect from web information's of all camp offered cooking completes and stoves. And, I was not satisfied.

Therefore,I involved myself in construction of portable equipment, which shall satisfy - ME.

Goal was:
- Good heat transfer and saving
- Smallest amount of fuel
- Protected, independent, reliable.

STEP 1: I Prefer Inox As Material

In the cheap housewares shop I found a suitable different Inox pots, very convenient for my purpose. I do no like Al dishes and pots.
And I start to rebuild and adjust.

STEP 2: Remodeling

I need to make a connection between two pots. I took a strip of Inox steel and form a necklace for inside surrounding upper part of pot/can. 

STEP 3:

To connect part I use pop up rivets,- (it can be done also with adequate screws or hart welding). It is necessary to take enough rivets to get good strong - tight connection. 

STEP 4: Rivets, Holes, Connections....

So this part was relatively easy, although a drilling holes in Inox steel is tricky... you need a special drills and start from smaller hole upwards.  

STEP 5: Two Pots

There they are...and now to next step.

STEP 6: Still Steps to Go...

I measure diameter, find out good distribution points for 8 mm holes and drill, starting from 3mm to 8 mm.
Than I took a small thin grinding diamond wheel and cut out bottom hole, remove the sharp edges, correct exact inside circle and...

STEP 7:

Than I took smaller pot and insert them inside a bigger pot... and got Kpot!

Outside pot serve as:
- holder
- windshield
- flame guide
- Thermos insulation 

This was a goal to save as much as possible fuel consumption, to get reasonable heat transfer, regardless of a speed of cooking.
In the field I have time...few minutes more ...who cares. 

STEP 8: Stove

Well...
It was written, almost everything, about the alcohol stoves. The most interesting article I found in  http://zenstoves.net/Stoves.htm
You tube present a movies about jet, chimney, filter ... you name it, stove.

Okay, so I took beer cans and cola cans and make a dozen models, try them ...... an finished on two which I use.

At this step I only point out on few tricky part at DIY stove:

- Cutting Al can ... it helps add few drops of oil on the blade
- Assembling upper and lover part is tricky.  It helps  a small bend around lower part or two mm cuts on edge al around   
- Upper part need to be widen and I use two parts of cans, put inside each other to get stronger walls on which I rube the edge of
  cam to wide it a little...just enough to easy glide on lower part at assembling...

STEP 9: First Test

In the lower part of Kpot, which was dedicated for holding stove I made gliding support to be able to adjust the height of stove against
bottom of upper pot, so the flame can be used as much as possible, for best combustion.
Ad holes around  to get intake of air and oxygen, eventually to make a shimmer for regulating heat. But it works already OK.

STEP 10: Kpot With Chimney

Another idea which burgle my mind, was hot to use chimney effect (in old days in bathroom used wooden stove to heat water for bath).
So I purchase on scrapyard aluminum part a small conical tube an built it in the same pot as allready used for water. 
It was idea that Al. shall conduct and transfer heat energy to water efficiency.  And it seam that is correct.

Pros: - Faster 5-8% boiling time
           - Outside walls of lower pot are colder 

Cons: - Pot has smaller water volume
            - Tricky to clean
            - Upper cover shall have a hole to allow chimney effect

Perhaps I shall develop this in future with welded Inox conical tube - chimney from thinner  material ... it could be good  improvement...

STEP 11: Boiling Test...

And now the conclusion...

I tested inside house (cca 21C) both solutions and here are results:

In a stove I put 17 ccm alcohol.

Usual pot with 0.5L water starting temperature cca 16C to boiling in  cca 14 minutes... stove burn further cca 3 minutes.

Pot with chimney with 0.5L water starting temperature cca 16C to boiling in cca 13 minutes... stove burn further cca 4 minutes.

Then I collect all parts and sew the Kbag ... it is now ready to pick up and go. 


Sincerely Yours,

Comments

[Nomadsanity]

All that being said, excellent design and good use of available inexpensive materials. I have recently completed development of my own backpacking cook kit and I have been hunting improvements. I have seen a Kpot before and the idea completely slipped my mind, I will have to see what I can do with it in addition the the stove I built. All in all, good instructable. My hat is off to you sir!

[Nomadsanity]

From what I can see of the lid on your "chimney" pot there is one improvement I would recommend. Make the chimney continue through the lid as well. The way that the setup appears now, the steam from the warmed water would tend to force its way back down the chimney reversing the daft or at the very least severely hampering its performance. You will want to have some sort of limiting damper to help keep some of the hot combustion gasses going around the pot as well as up the chimney to make maximum use of the surface area available on the pot for heat transfer.

[XxZombiexX]

I just made my first alcohol stove from aluminum cans a few days ago and immediately saw the same need for a compact cooking setup to keep as a kit. I will definitely use many of the features you demonstrated here in my own, especially drilling holes in a circle then cutting to form a holding collar with vents. Thank you for posting!

[lsf]

Looks like russian self heating boiler named samovar.