As a follow up to our field review on the Jetboil PCS we took it up above tree line in winter to see how it performed. We had high hopes of melting a lot of snow with the Jetboil. In winter conditions in the backcountry a stove is not just a way to cook a meal, but it a critical piece of safety gear.
We were disappointed with the jetboil camping stove in these conditions.
Hard to light
Josh spent quite some time trying to light the jetboil. He was outside the tent in gusty wind conditions. As mentioned in our earlier review the piezo ignition had already failed on the stove. So he tried using a lighter and matches. The wind made it very hard to light. In fact Josh couldn't get it lit in these conditions and so resorted to the relative protection of the tent's vestibule to finally get the stove lit.
It should be noted that while the conditions were poor they were by no means extreme. We were at 2000m elevation with the wind gusting around 20-30kph. We were in a sheltered position behind a rocky outcrop.
In recent years, many camping shops are stocking the butane portable stoves. They are pretty small, easy to use, come in their own carry case, and have a self-ignition system.
But how do they perform and are they economical?
We first tested one in controlled conditions;
• inside (no wind)
• 19 degrees
• one litre of room temperature water for each test
Test one
With a brand new cartridge it took 5 minutes 40 seconds to boil, using 18 grams of fuel. This equates to 20 cents to boil one litre of water. At that rate you would be able to boil one litre of water about 12 times from one cartridge.
Test two
We then tried it again with a cartridge that was forty percent full. With this cartridge it took 5 minutes 30 seconds to boil and used the same amount of fuel.
I decided to get a 'light my fire' scout fire lighting steel. It's designed to easily light a stove or fire even when wet. It's "approved by the International Survival Instructors Association" so should be a good bit of safety gear when playing in the wilderness.
So does it really work when wet? We tested it in this video
Recently the Jetboil personal cooking system accompanied me on 2 hiking trips. It was a good test to see what the stove is like in a real situation. How did it go and is it worth all the hype that it's getting?
Jetboil stove overview
Jetboil has created a new category in hiking stoves - the high efficiency canister stove. These stoves waste almost no energy and use far less gas to boil your water, in fact as little as half as much. They are also fast. The reason is the FluxRing™ technology which evenly distributes the heat to the whole pot.
The good - what we liked
We get 12 boils of one canister, very efficient
We liked the package and how it packed together
While variable, the boil times were quite low compared to many other stoves
