Alcohol Stove 2.0 Easier, Stronger, and More Robust! Build for under $2! Full instructional video. 

First, sand the paint off the inner can. If necessary, also sand the inside of the outer can. It has a thin plastic layer in it. Then everything fits a little easier. Thanks for the video.

I seriously doubt i will ever make one of these, but I felt the strange NEED to KNOW how "just in case" 😉 nicely done dude!

Awesome video. I love how you didn't hide your "trial and error" phase of the build.

Been making these penny stoves for years now, but this is by far the simplest and strongest build I have come across. Thank you for this. Next step, for me, is to teach a group of Scouts how to build and use one of these for Cast Iron Cooking.

Here's a suggestion. Use two soup cans to make your penny stove. A whole long stronger than a soda can. That way if it gets stepped on if it gets knocked down it will be squished. With a soup can it won't be crushed. :)

Fantastic! I started going ultralight as a backpacker back in 2008 and made probably 20 of these stoves. I had all the same issues you mentioned. My wife and I are now preparing for an 8 day trip into the Bob Marshall and I'm debating going back to these instead of my pocket rocket. Thanks for the soup can tip!

Glad I found you man. I like the content. Different from any others and insanely satisfying .

Channels like these help me prepare for the apocalypse

lots of people do not know its a shame in the why they not know this its easy if needing to for survival - which all people should know this straight out of the gate thank you for this nice video sir good well done indeed

Make about three shims from the extra can material and insert them inbetween the two halves when you push them together then pull them out once you get them started and slowly push the two halves together. Also pushing the bottom half up around a full can will stretch it slightly and make it much easier to push the two halves together while maintaining a good seal. Instead of making a cover for the center hole you can simply use the bottom without the center cut out and fill through one of the holes with a syringe.

Try putting carbon felt around your stove. It will prime yourself right up, especially in the chilly weather.

👍 Neat .. thanks for that. I must take a look at using a more robust better-fitting can as the base. Currently, my favourite is a 200ml Energy Drink Can. * Cut off the Top and Bottom to the required height. * Leave the Top Centre in situ .. just remove the leftover pull-off Tab. * Drill extra holes to suit (you'll find out what works best for you) in the top centre bit .. for me, on the inside edge opposite the 'drinking hole'. * Flute the top piece to facilitate the fitting together. Top goes into bottom. * Fill the bottom section with Glass / Ceramic Wool or Carbon Cloth. This appreciably reduces the effect of fuel spillage in case of an 'Oops' and doesn't seem to effect the burning efficiency of the burner. * Fit together .. that's it. I cook all sorts of stuff on these burners .. including Full English Breakfasts. Good share .. thanks. Take care ..

Interesting. This is worth giving it a try. I agree that making this as a penny stove would simplify the build and eliminate the problem you had controlling the flame. Thanks..

Just made one with a Ortega chili can and a pop can. I removed the baffle and didn't remove the bottom of the pop can. Stuffed it with fiberglass. 16 burner pinholes and one fill hole fitted with a small screw in the center top of the pop can. Fill it up, put the screw in, fill the bottom one more time and light it. Watch it bloom.😊 Thanks for the tips❤

This is great information!!! Yeah if you look at most pop cans they say "ball" on the side, so they are a standard size.

great tutorial. definitely making this with the scout troup i lead. i was looking for an alternative for the soup can scince condensed soup is hard to find where i live. i found out those tiny vegetable tins (about 150-200 gram) have the same circumference. soda can fits nice and snug on top without creasing. cheapest one i found was only 50 cents. add a cheap 30 cents can of soda to that and the cost is even under 1 euro.

I love this idea...I'm going to do it is some type of modified sterno "stove" frame. Thank you for your efforts in this video.

I admire your dedication to finding cans that fit. Good job! Never thought of using soup + beverage cans. I've made a lot of alcohol burners. Started with beer cans. But the material is too thin and would tear easily. Now I use squirt cheese cans. To get the pieces together I expand the bottom by rubbing it on a 1" dowel that is locked in a vice. Kind of hard to describe... My burners do have an inner sleeve. Partly because the cans are smaller diameter, the circle of jets (holes) are smaller than on beer can stoves. Helps keep the flame pattern a narrow inverted cone. I was going for max burn efficiency and my best is 4 cup boil (65F water) on 1 ounce of alcohol. I like squirt cheese cans because they are aluminum and about 4x thicker than beer cans. Some videos on my channel. TomLovesDIY. Best regards, Tom

It's a good thing I eat alot of soup and have been keeping the cans. I like to use a Cambell's can inside a Progresso can to make gas-a-fire hobo stoves. Going to try this alcohol stove build. BTW I found your content through RU-vid Shorts. Keep it up.

Inner baffle ring is for efficiency when alcohol vaperizies. It last way way longer. But takes longer to prime it. I use a zippo for about a minute to warm it up.

If You use a inner divider , You have to equally divide three or four notches for the fuel to go up to the jets. ( vapor actually )

If done correctly the same size works well if you take needle nose pliers and go around the edges of the can going inside and twist little flutes around the edge about 3/8” long and they work perfectly. I have built many of these. Look at the penny can stove videos.

cool video, me and my dad learned something new we could use for our next camping trip.

Thanks for sharing. Main improvement on the video for me would have been to take out the five minutes of trying various brands of cans that didn't work.

Thanks a lot for sharing your knowledge and for being helpful for others. It's really useful. Cheers from Portugal

Use the bottom of a full can to slowly stretch/flare out the can for the bottom by wriggling it around carefully stretching the opening. There are videos of others doing this. I think they call them penny stoves. Thanks for your posting

If you're a UL nut, and haven't gone no cook yet or are just interested in building your own setups, here's a few recommendations from my years long obsession into my cook kit; The wider your cooking vessel, the least amount of heat, thus fuel, is wasted. Look for short, not tall. You can build an alcohol stove out of nearly anything. A favorite combo of mine is a simple aluminum container with a lid, the body is filled with carbon fiber, *i think it's called, the lid works perfectly for an esbit system. You need a frame for this and remember to always use a windscreen with any esbit/alcohol in the wild or else you're not getting a hot meal. Don't ever use red heet or you're probably going to burn something down. The flames are too unpredictable. Always yellow heet, it's available practically everywhere I've been.. When building any stove, I found using a calculation available on zenstoves (youtube won't allow me to link) and building specifically to a certain pot/mug was the best for fuel consumption. Zenstoves has amazing free to build designs and information on their site and I use it often. If you are looking for something that weighs nothing and has fuel consumption down to a science, go to flatcatgear and talk to Jon. You won't find anything better regardless of altitude, weather and the options available when it comes to cooking in the backcountry. Now that I've been through years of use in real life, I always prefer esbit. FYI; NO ALCOHOL OR ESBIT STOVE CAN BE USED IN AN AREA WITH FIRE RESTRICTIONS. YOU MUST HAVE A STOVE WITH AN ON/OFF VALVE. Although, in my experience my alcohol and esbit systems are much safer and more reliable. I've had plenty of problems with canister setups. The less moving parts the better, generally. Flat cat gear video of bobcat system; ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-eAMGtVKEj_Y.html Hiram's page is very informational; ru-vid.com

I’ll remember this forever

Nice. You have a nice voice and the editing is spot on.

I use two can halves the same circumference and just add lengthwise creases with needle nose pliers around the circumference of one half and they slide together nice that way

Very gratefull for this nice idea. I had my gas cut off and As we are going towards the winter,It would be' nice to be' able to cook a nice warm soup sometimes insted than cold salads!!!!!soo thanks a lot and greatings from italy

Great vid, packed with info - I dug the use of the dreaded 'red bottle' as well as that rather innovative three-nail stove!

Idea!! If you have carbon felt, wrap a layer, or two depending on the thickness, around the inside of the soup can. Next take your baffle and put a TON of v cuts into the bottom and place into soup can. Finally, press the soda can down until the baffle seats into the lip of the soda can. Now you effectively have your own Trangia burner. You can then cut the bottom of another can right at the shoulder where the "label" ends, cut out the center of the bottom dome as a simmer ring

When I was a kid my mother bought these little cans in bulk, they were basically exactly like this. Only real difference was the wick and the fact that it was industrially made with much more durability and already had fuel. This is MUCH cheaper though, so I think the tradeoffs are worth it

Have you tried cooling the monster can base and heating the bang top can? You may be a really neat and tight fit using thermo principles of expansion/contraction of metals from heating and cooling.

Frankly, I highly recommend buying a few folding mini gas stoves with built in tripods with flexible extension tubes, and as many cartridge converters so you can just use the widely available gas cartridges (the kind you see used for portable gas stoves in steamboat restaurants) on top of regular camping canisters (not as common). The flexible extension tubes allow you to connect the cartridges lying flat. Really gives much more control over the strength of the flame. Only benefit to an alcohol stove is that you can just top up the bottle of alcohol for the next trip as compared to carrying 1 full and 1 half-used gas cartridge. Again, there is a work around for that called a refill adapter which you can use to refill the cartridges using a larger gas tank. I personally think gas tanks and cartridges are safer when stored properly compared to liquid alcohol.

In boy scouts we used those old bigger foster cans ..

Excellent presentation!

Soup can bottom! Brilliant! I've made tons of these and used them for years, but never thought of the soup can. Will definately try it tomorrow. What did you use for the lid? Did you need jb weld to seal the 2 together?

Best I've seen and so simple. Good video!

Use Pennie’s and a small center hole. Cover the hole made in the middle with a penny and it works awesome

I absolutely must know this information! Thanks!

Thank you brother very cool this might come in handy one day was eyeing that esee

I've made a few of these type burners and had very good results with them and ultimately ended up with a cat can stove because it's so simple lol. The one with fiberglass and mesh works well. Nice tattoos also 🤘

redbull can and the green can, you can make a mini fancy feast stove, enough gap to slide some carbon felt in there.

Three metal tent stakes works pretty good for an improvised pot stand. I use Denatured Alcohol in mine and sometimes even a 190 proof food grade alcohol from the liquor store.

Cut the bottom can a little shorter than normal so that you don't have to force the top into the bottom all the way to the ring. The ring area isn't going to give any. So once it gets there it splits

High temp gasket maker to make it a solid unit and it’s perfect.

Woth that many energy cans You turned into a humming bird already ? ❤😂

You can take a full can of the same brand as the outside half, and stretch the rim over the bottom of the full can. Just stretch a little bit at a time, then turn the can and stretch the next area. After about 4-5 times, the entire rim will be stretched, and the other half will fit inside it. Then press slowly together, being careful not to tear the outer half, or crimp the inner half. 5:00 You know, other soups come in the exact same size can.

make a hole in the outer, upper half, then press a full soda can into it. the full can will expand the lip of the upper, allowing it to slip on

The soup can is a great idea! Thanks man!

Sabborro beer cans are a little strangely shaped but are stainless steel 👍🏻

Just one little tip... Sprinkle some Thyme on the egg as you fry it. ;-)

You can simply press the one bottom piece into another (both bottoms facing downwards) and expand it this way.

So you mentioned the inner ring is of no real use. I agree. Ill add the cap is also a waste of effort, and that the penny stove concept with the holes poked into the top works perfectly. Any coin works.

You could save yourself some time "experimenting" with different pop cans if you'd look around the base for the manufacturer. Most I run across are made by Ball. Same size.

I'd suggest the water boil test to see the efficiency of this design.

Re can sizes - those things are standardized, and most brands, competitors or not, buy from the same suppliers.

I played with these for a long while and settled on stoves like Zelph's Fancy Feast or the newer X-Boil. Better all around.

Wow this is actually really cool! Not sure if I missed the explanation, but is the cap for the stove the rounded bottom of a soda can?

ILL TRY IT

I remember making one when I was young and I used a axe body deodorant can.

Did you see the stove build where the guy put the can that slides inside the other one on its side laying on a toothpick and push down on it with his finger every quarter of an inch and then the can slid together just like that you don't have to go down very far maybe 3/8 of an inch and it puts a little crimp every quarter of an inch and the inside can shrinks down just a shade on the edge so it started and ready to go on

I use a full version of the can to help shape the top. I also make sure it is warm.

100%I’ll use this very useful thank you

Is it better than the CatCan (also called Fancy feast) stove. Many people saying that CatCan is a better version of the alcohol stove. For Canadians‼️ we don't have Yellow HEET here but you can get 1 gal of Methyl Hydrate for 15CAD in the paint section at Canadian Tire. ➡️ methyl alcohol = methyl hydrate = carbinol = wood alcohol = wood spirit.

The internal ring may be, to avoid leaking fumes, from the joint.?🤔

amazing work!

If the flames can be put out by placing a pot directly on the stove, why not make the holes further down the can? To create airspace between the pot and the flames? In other words, do the holes need to be as high on the can as they are here?

I liked everything. But I got lost with the center thingie and have no idea what you did or how you did it.

Im gunna let my kids watch this and then build it so they will learn as well.

You are so underrated

Amazing, exactly what I needed!

Sweetheart if you want it stronger and more robust just use two bottoms from an aluminum beer bottle there really thick for some reason!!!! Mine came out nice!!! You should try It sugar bear 🐻!!!

Would heating the edges of the can to a point where the paint/logo would dissapear make a difference? Might make it a better fit?

This was actually very useful

The center cap wasn't mentioned but I assume it was part of a soda can?

Man That's Great!! Thanks For The Tip!!

Thanks

Fosters beer cans are very wide. If you could find a soup can to fit it you'll have a wider stove.

Fun fact: You can watch this entire video upside down and not realize until the end

Good stuff! How long does the flame last with full grey liquid on?

Holy shit is the coolest thing I’ve seen in a while, I’m definitely going to try this. I know you said you used Isoheat in the video but what exactly is that?

This is so cool.

awesome video

I have yet to build one, I'm a procrastinating old guy🤣. The insert at the bottom should have 2 notches in it, one opposite the other. I'm think not to take the center completely out but make like 5 hole in the center with your push pin fill it, light it and put a penny, nickel over the holes. But love the soup can... That's great!.

If you use the center wall you dont need the lid.After a few seconds it comes through the burner holes.

Cool nice cheap items to add to my survival bag. What alcohol would be best to use ethyl or isopropyl? I'm thinking the fumes from isopropyl may be somewhat toxic?

Very cool. Thank you.

I really like the videos

Great video I’m glad I learned how to do this. However I was a little confused as to what exact type of alcohol it would use, and also the cap that you used as well to retain the flame? Would this be safe to use in enclosed spaces like a car for heat if trapped? Finally, how long can the stove stay lit? Thank you!

Most cans are standard sizes as they are generally made on the same machines

That’s very cool

Just to make sure, you can’t put it out right? Only let it deplete its fuel?

Love cream and mushroom soup

How did you make the center cap? Did you poke holes in the center cap? Thank you!

Metal expands on heating so probably you should try them again but with some heat

4:11 is when he pulls out the soop

Im curious, do you turn it off by just covering somehow? How would you recommend extinguishing it?