Portable Gas Stove - ArniesAirsoft

Author

Marlowe

Now with added Nam.

Registered: November 2004
Location: South Yorkshire
Posts: 305,974

Review Date: 16/9/06

Would you recommend the product? Yes | Price you paid?: �16.99 | Rating: 8

Positive aspects of the product (pros):	Resilient design, Sturdy Packaging & Easy-to-Use Design
Cons:	Not practical for use in hiking / Patrol games, etc - but it's not supposed to be!

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First Impressions:

Having previously relied upon hexamine stoves and the goodwill of other campers at weekend airsoft events, I was truly relieved when Gordon of Highlander kindly saw fit to offer one of their flatbed stoves for review. This stove, powered by a butane gas cylinder, comes with a small single hob cooker, making it ideal for cooking a pan or boiling a kettle�and as we all know, there�s nothing more important at 6am on a cold grey morning than a good brew up!

The first thing you encounter when receiving this stove is the box. It�s a sturdy corrugated grey plastic affair which lends well to use in the field due to its resilient waterproof nature, and has a simple but fairly sturdy plastic clip which closes it, with a carry-handle on top. This makes this ideal for transporting by hand over short distances.

Upon opening up the box, I was presented with a metallic stove which had a visually-pleasing mottled �leopard-spot� style speckled black finish. The stove itself seems very similar if not identical in design to other flatbed stoves available on the market, with a side pivot-opening compartment for storage and connection of the gas bottle (kindly provided with a bottle of Highlander�s own brand gas in this case), and a larger stove area next to it, complete with a ring which flips over during storage to minimise the space taken up by the stove.

When flipped over, this ring results in a single-hob gas stove, ready for use. Setting up the stove was a refreshingly straightforward affair, even for a novice in field cooking appliance such as myself. The cover to the gas compartment pivots open, to reveal space for a gas canister to be fitted inside. Pulling off the cap of the canister, it was a simple affair to slot the canister into the mounting mechanism, the nozzle of it sliding in towards the front of the compartment, where it fed into an awaiting cap. The canister was pushed down and then locked in place by pushing down a large black lever on the front of the stove.

And�That�s it! The stove�s ready to use. In this day and age of overly complex design, such simplicity is welcomed, especially on a gloomy morning or in the twilight of a hastily erected campsite. Igniting the stove is a simple affair � gas is switched on by twisting the dial, and as with any standard gas cooker, the stove auto ignites the gas ring, as well as the strength of the flame controlled. Anyone who has ever used a gas hob will have no problems with this.

It should be mentioned however that a little more attention is required while fitting after-market canisters. Whilst this stove is compatible with all standard (eg non-Coleman shape tall and thin) butane camping gas canisters, we found that some required a little more brute force to connect properly to the stove, perhaps due to imperceptible variations in their dimensions during their manufacture. As long as care is taken (which should always be employed when using a gas cooking appliance), this should not pose a problem however.

Post-Skirmish Evaluation

The stove�s debut was made at Operation Vortex, the 2006 Fireball international weekend, based at Sutton Coalfield. After erecting the tents of team FMJ, we pulled out the stove and decided to brew up some tea using a standard aluminium kettle.

After the aforementioned issue with a third-party gas canister, we found that the kettle boiled with the dial set to medium heat after about four-five minutes. This may not seem too rapid, but compared to the eternity such a task would take using a hexamine stove, we were satisfied with this time.

It should also be mentioned that the weather throughout the event was somewhat unpredictable in nature, varying from light breezes and sun through to fairly heavy rains at times and stronger breezes. During such times, the efficiency of the stove appears to have been affected by the wind. Whilst I am by no means an expert, this appears to be fairly normal for any portable gas stove.

Satisfied with its performance, the stove was used throughout the weekend in varying conditions. Prior to the event I must confess to being somewhat worried about the gas consumption of the stove, as it had appeared to consume the gas of the own brand canister with worrying speed. As a result I had bought several canisters of gas with me, just in case. However, I am pleased to report that despite fairly frequent usage throughout the event by individuals for boiling water and cooking tinned foods, the spare canisters remained untouched. A single canister it appears is more than enough to last usage by a team for a weekend, and considering how relatively inexpensive such a canister is (the official Highlander canisters - code GAS02 on their website - retail at �2.50), this is a fine price to pay for warm food and drink.

One slight issue we did notice was that throughout the event the canister mounted in the stove regularly became unclamped within the compartment. It appears that the spring-loaded clamp design of the stove is fine when left perfectly stationary, but small jolts of movement (for instance when the stove was packaged away) easily unlock the clamp. For this reason I would advise that gas canisters are (whenever possible) stored outside the stove � particularly during transit.

Overall however the stove performed admirably. It worked the whole weekend on a single canister, and both the stove and the packaging were fine despite being left exposed to the elements (which in the case of the weekend often consisted of pouring rain). As a result I will have no second thought about taking this to every weekend event in the future.

Conclusion

I have no issues whatsoever with recommending this stove to anyone seeking a reliable and resilient portable camping stove. Whilst it can be hard to pick out the virtues of such an appliance typically, I had no problems in this case: in addition do working when requested (something which I wish the rest of my airsoft kit could emulate�), the stove was well built, practically packaged, and relatively frugal with its consumption of gas.

Due to its dimensions, the stove is perhaps best used at airsoft events where you will be able to return to a campsite at night however, as I suspect that the flatbed design will make it somewhat cumbersome for patrol games or long distance hikes. However, for any event where you will have access to a fixed campsite or car for meal-times, this stove will prove invaluable for anyone craving hot food or a warm drink. And let�s face it: at some point, that person will be all of us!

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