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Thread: galley stoves

  1. #1
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    kerosene stove

    Have reread tpalmer's thread and Capt Dave's (and Maria's) cook top choices. Does anybody else have a good relationship with a kerosene stove? There seem to be other folks who are looping around to the less explosive fuel. Kero has other atvantages in that it can be used for lamps and exterior backups in case the battery dies.

    I think I also have a problem making such a big deal out of the kitchen by using available s.s propane stoves/ovens that fit better on larger yachts. Rather refurbish with a more modest stove top.

    Kerosene, correct me Please!, may be carried below deck. If in cans how do you vent? OK so you don't vent store boughts. Trying to contrast here with propane that on an Ariel MUST be on deck, probably on the cabin top in a locker. Did focus befor on 1 pound bottle installations - but that really can't be done on boxey gimbeled stoves so far as I know. Kerosene is looking better and better.

    So I'm asking: are there successful gimbeled kero cook tops? Really nice ones? Have no use for an oven! Ones with rails and pot holders and self-pricking burners that you don't have to replace every week? Any SMOKELESS wonders? Any that you don't have to pre-ignite with alcohol? Probably have ten choices in Europe - any here?

    So specific because I've axed the diesel auxillary possibility for a bloody outboard. Mostly because of the bad smell. So inviting kerosene aboard seems stupid. Guidance anyone?
    Last edited by ebb; 05-18-2004 at 11:40 AM.

  2. #2
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  3. #3
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    “Force 10 carries replacement burners and accessories for diesel/kerosene stoves. Custom models available. Call for details.”

    23080 Hamilton Road
    Richmond BC
    Canada
    V6V 1C9
    Toll-free 1-800-663-8515
    http://www.force10.com/cooktop.html

    Of course, there's always: http://narang.com/miscellaneous_surg...ene-stove.html

    See the side tank dougle burner model . .

  4. #4
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    hmmmm... that chinese baby... you get hungry half an hour after you use it? Not funny. Made polite inquiry for info.

    Now those india ones....how about that brass four burner in one combo, looks like a temple! But then there is that 40 wick cooker! No kidding, I ran across someone lamenting that he had a stove once (or was that marymascara Dave?) who had used regular mop yarns for his wicks in a stove he once had. Didn't have to buy expensive wicks. Looks like it's all right here!

    Once, long long ago on a cold winter morning, I remember frantically wiping black soot out of my baby girl's nostrils - from a karosene heater.

    I know, when looking at the ads and product literature, I need to see the right words. And the words that are not there are just as important!

    Isn't it the PRESSURE kerasene appliances that are the problem? Of course that's 95% of everything available. Those multiwick one-assumes-non pressure stoves look intriguing. Maybe a gimbal like the seaswing could be made. Will have nothing but time to make one when cruising. What are the wicks? How good are the stoves? They are made by a hospital supply company - how bout that! Are they rural? Do you have to take them outside when you light 'em up and to turn off?
    Last edited by ebb; 05-18-2004 at 04:21 PM.

  5. #5
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    Ebb,

    Check these out...looks like quality stuff. One of the links tells how to make the wicks out of a mop head. Sounded like a lot of work to me so I kinda blew it off, but if you needed a hot meal, it wouldn't be too bad. These seem to be oriented towards "survivalist" types, but, I guess survival isn't necessarily a bad thing.

    The url is:

    http://www.endtimesreport.com/kerosene_cookers.html

  6. #6
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    The pressurized stoves are nothing to fear as long as treated with respect and reasonably maintained...not unlike the rest of a sailing craft.

    Remember, for years and years we were all a-feared of propane in the boat. Even the good 'ol CG insisted that pressurized alcohol was a wonderfully safe alternative. Then, we gotta pick our favorite likely culprit...

    ---The "boating Public" became infested with people who simply HAD to have all the discomforts of home...

    or

    ---Kenyon-Homestrand was nearly gone broke because the stoves lasted forever.

    or

    The "boating public" became obsessed with "safety" to a pretty ridiculous extent because the activity itself has been marketed for sale to people with more money than good sense. This may ruffle feathers or sound snotty, and it isn't meant to...but sailing is in and of itself an inherently hazardous activity (so is taking a shower, driving a car, or crossing the street, for that matter). Anyone who is capable of undestanding and respecting the inherent hazards of the water and the forces of nature against rigging, blah blah blah...can probably survive a pressurized stove just fine. Good lord, to hear it told it is a miracle that anyone survived having a gasoline auxiliary! Sheesh. Sold a lot of diesels, though!

    To my personal exposure the biggest hazard of a pressurized alcohol stove is that a guy might have to set sail beating a tide change or whatnot before he's had his coffee and pooch it good from lack of alertness...as it would take about 1/2 day or so to perk it (or just boil water) over the alcohol!

    For some reason...this is a bit before the time when I really paid attention to "why"...years ago a lot of folks ditched the kero. in favor of the alky. Sheesh.

    Well, here we are today all the same, and a nice byproduct of all of this is that there is a great selection of kerosene stoves and cookers at a used marine store near you for very little money. Bulkhead heaters, too.

    One of the things that inclined my good wife to be an engineless sailor...is that she gets very nauseous very quickly belowdecks with any sort of petroleum stank going on. While I think it could get costly with a 2-burner cooker, things like old seaswings and bulkhead heaters run very economically, and burn lamp oil just dandy...which doesn't stink like kero/diesel and puts out very little soot.

    The alcohol preheat on the burner is easily done in a safe and spill-less manner with a syringe and a little length of plastic tubing, BTW. I'm pretty good at the trick of sticking a match in a hole between two fingers and then yanking 'em back smartly, but since the advent of the aim-n-flame a guy need not even cultivate that skill.

    And hey...those old Kero units just look "right" in a good old-school boat like we're fitting out anyway!


    Best,
    Dave (AKA Mrs. Mary, S/V MANDARA)

  7. #7
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    Capt Dave, no offense, play on words, tis but a bit o' spice. And I can rage on the unjust, not here. Thank you for your kero philosophy. It is right on! Shall renew the search. Thanks Capt Greg.

    When I was a kid there were a couple old ladies up the street in a house my mother coveted. Have never forgotten how they smelled, when they opened the door - they always wore black - you were enveloped in a staggering plume, didn't know, being a kid, what it was. It was furnace oil and kerosene. Still with me, that.

    I recall the smell of kerosene cookers mixed with spaghetti sauce and coffee. I've never seen a gimbaled lamp that didn't have soot on the chimney or the enamel overhead. I'm always hoping progress has been made - and burning fuel with an unvented open flame below decks become a science. Maybe not. And the odorless fuel can only be purchased at boutiques in Slobovia not the Bahamas.

    Maybe with propane you are forced to be that much more exact in the installation. While you slide with the safer stuff. Trimming wicks and spilling kero don't sit too good in my belly either. BUT, the time has come for kerosene.

    Maybe.

  8. #8
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    Capt Greg.
    The stainless steel one looks substantial. And I can get it shipped to me in a plain box. Wonder if I can talk with these folks without shaving my head.

    Is this the mop wick one - the s.s Premier? - 10 wicks, wow! - how does it work??? Actually. Mops burn clean, tho, right?

    Off the grid, indeed. If armageddon comes will kerosene be delivered by our lady of fatima?

    The end is nigh. Better buy a goodly supply of mop heads. Get my onboard composting head hooked up with a methane collector - connect it to the galley. But I'll need a gass cooker. Now THERE is true recycling!

    Won't need no stinkin mops...
    Last edited by ebb; 05-19-2004 at 08:45 AM.

  9. #9
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  10. #10
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    Origo non pressure alcohol stoves

    I've been catching up on good things sailors are saying about Origo. Might be a resurgence in popularity, some manufacturers are again supplying galleys with them. You find them on rent-a-boats.

    I'm convinced there is no good place for propane tanks on 338. That decision took out the pricey swinging box stoves, even the two burner with infra-red broiler is nearly two feet wide. and you need the vented locker, the tubes and glands, solenoids, and maybe a sniffer in the bilge. It's just too dam finiky for me. Then I discovered the mini swing stoves don't hold a pressure cooker anymore, and where would I store a bunch of 1# propane cans anyway? And what about all those one way cans?

    Origo has a compact one burner (1500) - about 9 X 11 X 10 1/2" with the gimbal. That means 1/2 of the Ariel interior doesn't have to be a kitchen statement. It is always pointed out that alcohol takes twice as long to boil water. The official Origo time is 6-8 minutes for a quart. A sailor pointed out that the flame footprint is larger and more even than propane and thought the heat output and boiling time was actually about the same.

    A friend, a convert, dropped by the boat, says he's going to lend me one to try at home. So I'll check out the smell. I think my objections were from pressure pump stoves in the past.

    Origos are expensive, you betcha, BUT, just think, you buy one and install it, and boil water. With propane you have a huge safety rigamarol and a very dangerous fuel. An underlaying level of paranoia I've decided not to deal with. Alcohol disapates, like beer it disappears.

  11. #11
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    stove fuel

    Whenever you look into things a little things get dicey.

    Ethynol is made from any number of edible produce:
    potatoes, corn, beets, fruits, sugar cane, and grain. Edible in moderation for us humans.
    Because it is, our governmint, the ATF, tells the makers they must poison the ethyl alcohol. They do this by adding methyl a. (wood alcohol.) 100% poisonous to humans and probably is the additive that makes stove fuel nauseating to some.

    Denatured alcohol S-L-X (?) from the hardware is that edible alcohol made poisonous, otherwise it would come in glass and be called vodka and taxed to hell. On the gallon can I use for epoxy cleanup they say it's a "clean burning fuel for marine stoves." There is no MSDS on the can, so casual users like me don't know the composition of the solvent. I use a lot of it and breathe it all the time.

    Some agency (the ATF?) governs what can be labeled 'denatured alcohol.' Kleen Strip SLX is reported by one guy to contain 80% methanol, 17% ethanol, 3% MEK. Not something you'ld want to use in an enclosed space, I think, for clean up or fuel. (I have not researched this myself. but I will now get the MSDS for the Kleen Strip I use. I know no one should burn methyl on a boat!)

    Who can say what IS a stove fuel?

    On the Parks site, they list ingredients as Ethyl a. 93 - 96%, methyl a. 4 - 6%, m. Isobutyl Ketone 1 - 2%, Ethyl Acetate 1 - 2%, Gasoline 1 - 2%.
    Parks makes the product for many labels.

    Trying to make the point here that maybe this fuel is not a good thing to burn below without direct ventilation. 'Safer' (NONE OF THIS SOUNDS SAFE) fuel might be gotten in the states, but what would you be getting in the Caribbean Mexico or the Pacific?

    Any thoughts?
    Last edited by ebb; 08-22-2004 at 09:18 AM.

  12. #12
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    Hmmm.

    Ebb, I hate to be the harpy...but man, I have lived with and used alcohol stoves before...both pressurized and not...I mean, I GREW UP on boats with alky stoves...and I hate the things.

    The stink of the alcohol in an enclosed space is enough to get a person hurling as bad as the stink of kero in my book. But...the real issue to me is how cold the stuff burns. I like coffee before noon if I start it at 0700, you know?

    That much said, I was deperately trying to figure a good way to use the lazarette in the Triton as a propane locker and just flat couldn't. Too bad, as it worked so good in my friend's Vega, and it would have worked so good in the party-room-aft-cabin-suite lazarette of the Commander. Still, my immediate choices were:

    ---Big bottle in a deck box (nix, I like an uncluttered deck and do not like to carry weight up high)

    ---Smaller bottles in a pair secured inside the pushpit (nix, weight too far aft AND too high, and I know and respect Neptune's fist too well for that..."remember that passage where the big boarding wave took away the propane? Cold hash and DAK ham for 29 days, we finally slaughtered Dave and ate him raw to have hot food!")

    ---Costly and spookily cheap-looking storebought propane locker set into cockpit locker (nix, too small, drain is a problem waiting to happen as well as adding a hole in the boat and adding drag when the boat's heeled over. Cockpit lockers too small as it for a boat that has to carry somewhere between 9-12 bags in one and everything else in the other).

    They all stank, Ebb.

    I got Mary to capitulate on the 2-burner range and go with the single kero seaswing, but I worried about having no backup at all. You CAN bake some pretty good bread, even coffee cake, in the seaswing, it's just an odd shape. You cannot, however do lasagne..and that would be a real tragedy.

    A friend of mine had a half-famous Renegade for a long time, oh-so-originally named RENEGADE by the original owners. Ever sail on a Renegade? Sheesh, with that balanced spade setup the rudder post goes down thru the cockpit over a foot ahead of the aft cockpit bulkhead. Jay used to have a ful-size steeel BBQ tank back in one corner. He sewed a double-walled sunbrella cover to go over it, which had some of that hi-tech heavy-duty foilized bublewrap insulation in between the layers. Sun could beat on it all day, never popped the overpressure valve.

    Mary went off to the RV store and came back with a pair of aluminum tanks that are about 16" tall overall and just under 8" around. The actual poundage excapes me, but they are aparently about the same as carrying one BBQ tank or a little more. They happen to JUST fit in the aft cockpit corners of the Triton and still allow the tiller (I know, I had to dummy in a rudder post and fit the tiller to try!) to go pretty much hard over...as hard over as one practically takes it, at least. Still weight aft, but lower, and out of neptune's reach!

    If you want real simple though, I still have to carry on for the kero seaswing. Since we last exchanged about soot I have looked critically in the overheads when visiting friends whose boats are so equipped and who live aboard, hence the thing is used twice daily. Very little sooting, if any. I think the key is that the stove needs to be running well and you need to keep the burner good and clean. Again, kero sets Maria off puking furiously if she gets a good whiff while underway, so I used lamp oil instead last the issue came up. Now...while a little bit costly, that iunscented lamp oil is very efficient and very very clean...plus the little optimus burner in the things really just sorta sips at the fuel. Hisssss.....(Whistling!!!)....Raspberry Tea, anyone?

    Ahem. I should add, that Revere Ware make a really HD whistling teakettle, SS, in a small size to fit on a seaswing. MMMmmmm. Spiced Cider. Hot Chocolate. Dry heat in the boat from the stove. Tea.....

    Dave
    Last edited by marymandara; 08-22-2004 at 11:09 AM.

  13. #13
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    Dave,
    you can see why Force 10 is on my enemy list. FOR ALL TIME. Considering what small boat sailors have to put up with just to get a quart of water boiling, it is unconsciousable that Force 10 reworked their seaswing one burner so that it no longer would fit the 8 inch pressure cooker. The Forespar gimbaled single burner accepts only Forespar specially made pots, so I don't even consider anything as stupid as that. The design of the Force 10 at least allowed you to find your own pots and pans. Everybody has they own favorite, dented, blackened, bent, perfect one! Force 10 could easily fix the grate and rail to get that 8" cooker back in the cooker again, I even told them how they could do it, easy.

    Some cretin, who is not friendly to small boats at Force 10, came up with the new wire 'rose' pot holder, He cleverly made it part of the burner grate so that it robbed a whole inch of pot diameter. Now it is 7 inches, The really nice 8 inch pressure cooker I have won't fit. It is an insult. There has to be something wrong, maybe ethecally wrong, even sick, with a company that does that. Really, it is so illogical as to be sick. And I would like to be in an empty room with this person for just 5 minutes.

    OK, that's propane, with the little screw-on non-recyclable propane camping bottles. Representing possibly the only alternative down scale, back up, galley available. Yes, I won't consider keroene at all. My past experiences rule that decision.

    I am going to try the new wick powered Origos. The guy swore they had no smell. Except for the smell, if it proves to be there in the new Origos, it is the best fuel for a downsized galley in the Ariel. Clean burning, lighter than air, simple and safe. You, Dave, like to come up with flea market finds and antique deliverances. I will give a spanking new appliance the test. Man, sure hope I don't find some glaring stupidity in the Swede's cooker.

    If bread can be made in a pressure cooker,
    then lasagna HAS to be possible,
    It's a slow heat baking process. Right?
    Start layering on a moist bed of kelp
    in a well oiled pressure pot. use
    Italian mazarella and lotsa meat sauce on the bottom
    Cook real slowwww for hours
    then heat it fast befor you eat it.
    Last edited by ebb; 08-22-2004 at 07:01 PM.

  14. #14
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    Talking

    Well...I'd buy a lot of this crap brand new if anyone still made it!!!!

    It would definitely be easier, and I would be spared the load on my limited remaining brain cells of things like the how-tos of overhauling Optimus stoves, Kerosene Shipmate heaters and Wilcox-Crittenden Navy Pumps. I wish, I wish...

    Now...all I can wonder, is how much the optional Rube-Goldberg-mechanical-timer-start-the-stove-twenty-minutes-early part will cost you if you want the water to boil on the alky flame anytime soon. Maybe they burn hotter than the pressurized ones, but I don't remember that being too much the case from my relatively few times in using the non-pressurized version you are looking at. Good luck, and if all else fails we can sail close enough to throw you a thermos of hot tea, OK???

    Dave


    PS...I have one last idea, if you are real dedicated to making the propane-bottle stove work in a seaswing...

    Buy an old S/Swing stove minus the optimus or with a trashed optimus, do a little cut-and-paste, and make the Coleman 1-burner screw-it-on-a-propane-bottle "stove" guts attach to the bottom of the old SeaSwing. This really should only mean hogging out a hole in the cast aluminum base bigger. Might give it a look...
    Last edited by marymandara; 08-23-2004 at 05:54 AM.

  15. #15
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    Thumbs up Our Galley

    Well I don't want to get into a debate as to which stove is better, safer, cooks faster, etc. It all depends upon your perspective. As you all know a Commander does not have a galley, so we carry an Origo 3000. Yes, it does boil water in the coffee pot a little slower, than propane (we are also campers and use propane stoves) but then again, we are willing to wait for a good cup of perked coffee with a little baileys (if we are not sailing somewhere later) in the morning, while sitting in the cockpit and watching a beautiful sunrise and the wildlife around us. We cook on the Origo with a pressure cooker. Yes we have Lasagna, and lots of other good meals. You can make about anything in a pressure cooker. We also carry a charcoal mini weber grill. My husband will not grill on gas only charcoal. We have modified a fishing pole holder for mounting it on the boat. We also use it on shore or at marinas. The only time we do wish we had a galley down below is during inclimate weather. But, my husband is such a trooper, that he actually has cooked in full foul weather gear! He is the chef in our family and a darn good one. I have attached a couple of pics of him hard at work. Ahhh...great memories, good food and good drinks = wonderful cruises.

    Fair Winds,
    Attached Images    
    Liz Fagel
    s/v Fagel Attraction II
    Pearson Commander #75

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