Pepsi G Stove

It's not often that I buy a new piece of expensive gear, and then prefer to use something I made myself out of rubbish, normally it's the other way round, I build my own equipment and then when I can afford the real thing I buy it.

The Pepsi G stove is the exception to the rule, this little stove has been on several trips with me (here is a picture of it in use on the South Glenshiel Ridge, with an MSR winshield, MSR pot and coathanger pot stand), its size, extreme light weight and versatility (for simple cooking) make it an essential piece of Bivi kit.

Sadly I didn't invent it, it is Scott Hendersons' excellent Pepsi-G and Mini Stove designs.

To give mine that shiny finish I used Aluminum Cans, and polished with wet and dry sand paper.

Size of the Stoves

[Fig 1: The Large Pepsi G Stove]

[Fig 2: The large and small Pepsi G Stoves]

As can be seen from figures 1 and 2 the Pepsi G stove is pretty small, and the Mini stove (made from Red Bull Cans) is even smaller. Not much more to say...........

Pot Stand, Packing, Simmer Ring and Windshield

The pot stand shown in figure 3 is made from a wire coat-hanger, sorry about the quality of the picture. It is the correct size to fit in a little MSR pan I own, along with the stove. A wind shield is essential (as with all stoves), I use the MSR one that came with my Whisperlite.

The simmer Lid shown in figure 4 is just the top of a coke can, with a piece of wire twisted round it as a handle.

Flame Size

[Fig 3: The Pot Stand]

[Fig 4: Stove Simmer Lid]

The flames given off by the burner arrangement (figures 5 and 6) are similar to those you'd expect with a Gas stove (none of your trangia burning little more than an open cup of fuel). Whilst those shown seem very big and very sooty this is only because I took the photos without a pan in place (otherwise you wouldn't be able to see them), with a pan in place the burn is far more controlled. The images show the smaller stove to the left of the larger one.

As can be seen from figure 7 the simmer lid provides a simple low burn 'setting'. Please note that the simmer ring cannot be used until the stove has warmed up, otherwise it will put the flame out.

[Fig 5: Side view of stove burning]	[Fig 6: Top view of stoves burning]	[Fig 7: Stove Burning with simmer ring]	[Fig 8: Be CAREFUL!!!!]

One last thing, remember, be careful with the meths!!