MSR Whisperlite Universal -- First Videos, Detailed Photos

I'm in the process of writing a review of the new MSR Whisperlite Universal stove.


UPDATED 10/4/2011:  I have written a review of the MSR Whisperlite Universal.

See also this related post which contains additional info on the new (for 2012) stoves from MSR.

The new MSR Whisperlite Universal

I'm still working on the review, but I've posted some rough videos. Don't be expecting slick production values, but if you're interested in the stove, these videos should be pretty informative.

MSR Whisperlite Universal -- First Look







Field trial: MSR Whisperlite Universal, running on canister gas.





Another video of running the MSR Whisperlite Universal on canister gas.





The MSR Whisperlite Universal -- changing from liquid fuel to canister gas:





MSR Whisperlite Universal -- Flip Stop:





I've also posted some detailed photos -- and commentary:






I'll have more to say after I get the stove out in the field, but I thought I'd give you some preliminary thoughts now.

HJ

Stove of the Week: MSR XGK II (Pre-Shaker Jet)

Great strides are made by great men.  In the world of modern pack stoves, one man stands out:  Mr. Larry Penberthy, founder of MSR. Larry Penberthy (March 11, 1916 - November 24, 2001) was an iconoclastic genius. 

Behold his creation:  what is now known as the MSR XGK stove:

Penberthy observed that one of the leading contributers to the cold weather killer, hypothermia, was dehydration.  Why were mountaineers getting dehydrated?  When all the world around you is cold, hard, and white, water is tough to come by.  The stoves of the day were largely tank mounted brass stoves, beautiful works of art still cherished to this day, but hardly light.  Many mountaineers, unwilling to pack their excessive weight faced dehydration instead, risking hypothermia.  Penberthy, a mountaineer himself and a first rate engineer, set out to design a stove.  He noticed that climbers of the day tended to carry spare fuel in Sigg aluminum fuel bottles.  Why, he reasoned, should people carry in effect two fuel tanks (one as part of the stove and one in the form of the Sigg bottle)?  He designed a pump that would screw into a Sigg fuel bottle, turning the bottle into a pressurized fuel tank capable of delivering fuel to a burner.  His stove, now no longer sitting on top of a fuel tank was lower to the ground, making it relatively stable and bringing it down out of the wind.  He then added a sheet of approximately 6" x 31" heavy aluminum foil as a windscreen.  On stoves where the tank was directly attached to the burner, a windscreen of Penberthy's design could trap too much heat and cause the fuel tank to explode.  On this new type of stove where the fuel tank was separate, a windscreen could be safely used.  Today, we look at things like a fuel bottle used as a fuel tank with the fuel well away from the burner and an aluminum windscreen as obvious.  Let us not forget that it took a visionary like Penberthy to come up with something so simple and yet so effective.

He also made his stove field maintainable:  The jet could be unscrewed for cleaning or replacement with a simple slot head screwdriver.  He added a cable that ran down the fuel line that could be used to scour out carbon deposits.  Penberthy made the stove solid as though his life depended on it -- for in fact his life did.  Penberthy climbed using his own inventions.  Penberthy designed not only his brilliantly innovative stove but also ice axes, helmets, and other climbing equipment.  When taken as a body of work, his genius is clearly seen.

Penberthy's stove design revolutionized climbing stoves, providing a relatively light weight, relatively wind proof, effective stove, a stove that climbers were not only willing but glad to carry.  Sadly perhaps, Mr. Penberthy's design may have contributed to the demise of the classic brass pack stove.  Penberthy's first production stove was the Model 9.  The Model 9 was a white gasoline only stove.  The Model 9 was then joined by the "MF," a multi-fuel stove.  Later, the Model 9 became the G (gasoline) stove, and the MF became the GK (gasoline/kerosene) stove.  Later still, the G and GK stoves were merged into one stove, the XGK.  It is by the moniker "XGK" that this line of stoves is generally known.  The XGK was supplanted by a somewhat redesigned XGK II which dropped the wire coil around the generator, removed the surge dampener, eliminated the flint ignition, and did away with the aluminum cup which used to come with the XGK.  The XGK II had three versions:  the first without a shaker jet, the second with a self cleaning "shaker" jet, and the third also with a shaker jet, a redesigned spreader plate, and a new "X" type of removable pot support. Eventually, the XGK II was replaced by today's XGK EX.

To this day, many a mountaineer swears by the XGK.  In cold weather, the efficient, powerful XGK is the snow melting stove of choice.  Recently, I noted with interest some photos on a polar explorer's web page.  The stove in the photos?  The MSR XGK. A year or so ago, I had an MSR XGK on the table in front of me at a Sierra Club function.  One of the members, a serious climber, remarked, "on Aconcagua, that was the only stove that worked."  Aconcagua (22,841 ft/6962 m) is the highest point in the Western Hemisphere. 
It is only fitting that in my series on winter capable stoves that the XGK be included.

This week's stove is the first of the XGK II's, the pre-shaker jet XGK II.

The pre-shaker jet XGK II originally came in a long black bag, shown here beside a more modern XGK II bag:

The bag was marked with the old "Matterhorn" MSR logo.

The stove came with the following contents:  The stove itself, a third generation gray and black pump, a windscreen, a heat reflector, an alcohol squirter bottle, a stuff sack (the bag in the photo is not the original XGK II type bag), instructions, and a small parts and maintenance kit.

A closer look at the contents

 

This interesting insert came with this particular XGK II, an early model XGK II evidently produced shortly after the cutover from the XGK to the XGK II.  This insert was intended to supplement the regular instructions -- which were the instructions for the original XGK.

The original instructions say some fascinating things.  Take number "6" below.  It says "Use kerosene as a fuel and provide adequate ventilation..."  The rest has been crossed out by hand with a black marker, but it's still readable and says, "should weather conditions necessitate the use of the stove inside a tent."  There you have it, folks, the "elephant in the living room."  Everyone knows that in really bad weather that you have to cook inside your tent, yet every modern stove manufacturer prints warnings in big letters to never cook inside a tent.  Things were different back then.  They leveled with you instead of hiding behind their lawyers.

Nowadays, MSR says "only use MSR bottles with MSR stoves."  That's a pretty funny thing to hear from MSR when you consider that MSR stoves were designed to work with Sigg brand bottles!  Indeed, the thread of every MSR pump and every MSR bottle is based on Sigg's threads.  Again, in the old days, MSR was a lot straighter with you.  These instructions, though hand crossed out, say "Exercise care in the selection and use of other manufacturers bottles."

Next, let's look at the pump.  This is MSR's third generation of pumps, the gray and black pump.  The very first pumps were white, the second generation, of which there were many variants, was yellow and black.

I won't go into all the details here, but basically the gray and black pump was a step backwards for MSR.  The gray and black pump is inferior in every way except for the re-designed air supply tube which is an improvement.  MSR took a step backwards?  What happened?  Well, in 1980, Larry Penberthy sold MSR to REI.  REI started making changes to cut costs.  They redesigned the XGK, eliminating several costly items like the surge dampener, the flint ignition, the protective aluminum cup, and the coil on the generator.  They also completely redesigned the pump, coming up with the gray and black pump pictured above, a pump far less robust but much cheaper to produce.  MSR then gained a reputation for having crappy, unreliable pumps.  The next two iterations (red and gray, red and aquamarine) of MSR pumps were no better than the gray and black and possibly were worse.  Fortunately for stove users, MSR came out with their current "duraseal" pump some time around 2005, a much improved pump.  Is the duraseal as good as the old yellow and black pumps?  Perhaps, but the jury is still out on that.

Well, let's have a look at the stove itself, shall we?

Note the rigid fuel line.  The fuel line, when locked into the fuel tank (via the pump), forms part of the support of the stove.  The XGK is actually a fairly stable stove despite its relatively small base.  In the photo above, you will note the aluminum foil collar around the stove.  This is the heat reflector and is designed to reflect heat up to the pot, maximizing efficiency.  Note also the large diameter of the generator (pre heat loop).  The XGK can handle some pretty crude fuels.  Indeed, many a mountaineer has benefited greatly from the XGK's rugged, robust design when burning rather questionable third world kerosene while high on a remote mountain.

Included with this stove are the below shown parts:  a wrench/tool, a pricker for cleaning the jet, a "sintered" brass fuel filter, and a spare jet.

Note the letters stamped into the jet, an "X" and a "K".  The "X" indicates that this is an XGK jet (as opposed to any of MSR's other stoves), and the "K" indicates that this is the jet for kerosene.  The jet that comes installed with the stove is typically marked "X" and "G" indicating that the factory installed jet is the XGK jet for gasoline.  The "G" jet should be used with Coleman fuel, true white gasoline, automotive gasoline, naptha, panel wipe, "environmental" gasoline (e.g. Aspen 4T), aviation gasoline etc.  The "K" jet should be used with kerosene, diesel, jet fuel, Kleen Heet, etc.  Note:  Coleman type fuel and kerosene will always be the best fuels for pretty much any petroleum based liquid fueled stove.  In a pinch, you can burn some of these other fuels, but your stove will not run as well, will clog more (hope you know how to field maintain your stove), and may produce some pretty noxious emissions.  Use "alternate" fuels (fuels other than Coleman type fuel and kerosene) only when you have to.

Also included was this small squeeze bottle, intended to be used for alcohol for priming.

Alcohol is the traditional means of priming stoves that run on petroleum based liquid fuels.  It burns more cleanly (especially when compared to the nasty business of priming with kerosene), is easier to control the amount dispensed, and is far less prone to producing a fireball that can shoot up from the stove. Fireballs are particularly common when priming with gasoline type fuels.  Oddly, MSR no longer encourages priming with alcohol.

Here, the stove is set up and ready for use.  I've removed the windscreen for visibility's sake.

Here, the windscreen has been emplaced.

Time to fire her up and put the kettle on!

The XGK passes the "tea test" with ease.

Let's have a look at the flames, shall we?  The XGK is known for it's power and rightfully so.

  But note this shot here:

Now, I won't call that a simmering flame, well, not exactly, but that is a pretty low flame.  It took some fiddling, but I was able to get some relatively low flames out of an XGK.  I and other owners of older XGK's have noted that older XGK's are capable of a lower flame than newer XGK's.  Why might this be?  The pre-shaker jet XGK II and the shaker jet XGK II are so very similar; shouldn't the flames be the same?  I honestly don't know why the flames are different, but possibly there's something about having more empty space inside the jet that makes simmering more difficult -- empty space that has to be there in order for the shaker to, well, shake.  That's my theory anyway.  I notice the same thing on my pre-shaker jet MSR Whisperlite, that it simmers better than any shaker-jet Whisperlite.  This isn't isolated.  I've used multiple pre-shaker jet MSR stoves.  Every pre-shaker jet MSR stove that I've used has consistently simmered better than any shaker jet MSR stove that I've used.

Well, there you have it, the mountaineer's friend, the ultimate snow melting machine, the MSR XGK.

Thank you for joining me on another adventure in stoving,

HJ

The MSR XGK
What's good about it?
Powerful
Reliable
Stable
Efficient

What's bad about it?
Expensive (The XGK line in general -- although used ones can be a true bargain)
Loud
Difficult to simmer (although pre-shaker jet models simmer better)
The swiveling wire pot supports tend to move around too much during use.  (Newer models have done away with the old swiveling pot supports)
The rigid fuel line, while adding significant stability, is a bit hard to pack  (Pretty minor issue)

Overall, highly recommended.

Stove of the Week: MSR Reactor

Sometimes, technology can be brought to bear in ways that change the very game.  So it is with the technology of the MSR Reactor.

Hail the inferno; this is the hottest stove out there.  It boils water faster than anything else I've ever seen.  It's not light, it's not cheap, but dang is it effective.

Let's take a look.  Here's a Reactor all packed for travel. The handle locks across the clear lid holding everything securely.

Inside you can fit an 8oz/230g canister of gas, the burner, and a little bit more.  I've got it wrapped here in a wash cloth just to prevent rattling.  It could easily accommodate a spoon and a lighter.  One pushes the "ball" on the left side of the handle.  The handle springs up.  One then unfolds the handle, like so:

I like the fact that the handle locks down, holding everything in place, but herein lies a vulnerability.  The small piece of metal shown below is all that holds that handle in place.

Every time that handle is folded or unfolded, that small piece of metal has to bend.  Repetitive bending of a metal = metal fatigue = failure.  I've not heard of failures of this point, but they inevitably will come.  How soon?  I can't say, but I think this is a weakness in the design.  Note:  I don't mean to sound alarmist here.  I don't think the handle will fail immediately. I think we're talking about years here not days or months. 

Another nice feature, the burner nestles up inside a 8oz/230g sized gas canister.

OK, so it packs up nicely.  Fine.  But what the Dickens is all the buzz about?  I'll tell you.  HEAT, baby, heat.
The MSR Reactor is all about putting heat into whatever is in your pot.  How does it do it?  First, with a radiant heat burner.  It burns fuel, but not in an open flame like a normal burner.  Instead, the burner head is heated by the burning of gas and then heat is radiated into the pot.  The radiant heat burner:

Heat is transferred first by a fairly tight nesting of the burner underneath the pot.

And then by an integral heat exchanger

Wind?  Not a problem.  When the pot is mounted on the burner, you can't even see the burner.

Heat flows from the burner to the heat exchanger into the pot.  Any exhaust heat is forced up along the sides of the pot until it reaches the vents seen in the above photo, a process transferring yet even more heat to the contents of your pot while still being almost totally protected from the wind.  In a 100 mph gale on top of an exposed plateau at 15,000' (4500m), this is the stove to have.  Note also that I'm holding the burner at a steep angle.  The pot doesn't budge. If you jostle your pot in tight quarters, no problem.  Your pot -- and your supper -- are staying right where you put them.  No tippy, slidey action here.  Still, not a bad idea to put a set of "legs" under your canister if you've got 'em.  The Brunton CanStand, Primus Foot Rest, and JetBoil tripod stabilizer all should fit an 8oz/230g sized canister.  The JetBoil version is shown here.

Another nice feature?  How about liquid measurement lines on the inside of the pot?

And don't forget the little pack towel they give you.  I use it to protect the bottom of the burner -- and the bottom of the pot.

One caution:  This is a seriously hot stove.  A friend of mine walked away for a minute and got distracted.  When he got back, the pot had not only boiled dry, it had melted.  It's a dang good thing that his canister didn't overheat and explode.  As it was, he lost his pot.  He could have lost a whole lot more.  This is a stove that you want to keep an eye on.

Well how about at the other end of the temperature range?  What about simmering? Well, the Reactor quite frankly has a bad reputation in the simmering department.  But lack of simmering is not a given with the Reactor.  There are a lot of individual variations Reactor to Reactor, and some of them do simmer if you're patient and willing to fiddle with them.  Here's a Reactor on low flame.

For a bit more on how to simmer, I'll refer you to this YouTube video that I put together.

Now, the question that is probably on every serious mountaineer's mind is, "how is it at melting snow?"  It's great.  It's super hot; it's wind proof; what more could you want?

Ah, but high tech though it is, it is still constrained by the laws of physics and therein the problem lies.  This is an upright canister stove.  On an upright canister stove, vaporized gas is fed to the burner where it is combusted, producing heat. In cold weather, gas doesn't vaporize very well.  There are a lot of factors that control whether or not a given upright canister type stove will work well in cold weather (you can see some of my other blog posts for more about this) and a Reactor will do better than some, but high tech or no, there's a point at which your fuel simply will no longer vaporize.  There are tricks you can employ like sleeping with the canister at night or carrying the canister inside your jacket by day and then using the first gas in the warm canister to heat up some water which is then placed in a spare pan into which you place the canister, but tricks like that can only take you so far.  My working number is 20F/-7C.  Below that, you begin to push your luck with an upright canister stove.  For all its technology, the Reactor cannot escape the constraints of physics.  Is it a good snow melter?  Sure.  Down to about 20F, maybe even a little lower.  But somewhere around that temperature 20F, you run into a hard stop, a hard stop that the Reactor's technology simply cannot overcome.

Note:  if you're a serious mountaineer and you're ascending to very high altitudes, you can operate a Reactor at lower temperatures than 20F.  Gas will vaporize at a lower temperature at higher altitudes.  But you'd better do your homework and understand just what the Reactor's temperature limitations will be for the altitude you'll be at.  Guess wrong and you've got no stove.  No stove = no water = dehydration which can lead to hypothermia which can lead to death.

Bottom line?  This is a great stove, but in cold weather you'd better darn well know it's limitations.

Thanks for joining me on another adventure in stoving,

HJ

The MSR Reactor

What's good about it
Hot
Wind proof
Stable
Hot
Well thought out
Extremely functional
Hot
Packable
Reasonably Efficient (if you don't run it on high)
Hot
Can nest an 8oz/230g gas canister inside the pot.
Liquid measures delineated on inside of pot
Did I mention hot?

What's bad about it
Expensive 
Heavy 
Bulky
Can eat a lot of fuel if you run it on high
Limited by it's upright canister type to temperatures of about 20F.
Can be tough to simmer.

Stove of the Week: Coleman Xpedition

Well, here's something I'd like to try:  A "Stove of the Week" post.  I doubt I'll be able to post a stove every week (but I'll try), but I collect stoves, I've got quite a number of interesting stoves, and I'd love to share them with you.  I take them out quite frequently in the winter, but when the temperatures climb, less frequently so.


Related posts:

• Stove of the Week:  Coleman Xpedition
• Stove of the Week:  Coleman Xtreme
• Update on Powermax Fuel 11/7/2011

For starters, here is the Coleman Xpedition two burner backpacking stove.  Yes, you read that correctly, a two burner backpacking stove.  Not many of those out there!

The stove is shown here on the ruins of Echo Mountain House a hotel built in the late 1800's atop Echo Mountain (3207'/977m).

Now the stove has something of a story.  First it came to me by way of a friend in England.  Ian sent it to me simply because he knew of my affection for and interest in this type of stove.  He asked for nothing in return.  I thank you very much, Ian, and I apologize that it's taken me this long to get it fettled (repaired) and posted. 

In terms of fettling, the "X" stoves that Coleman produced do have an achilles heel:  their connector.  I own half a dozen of the three types of "X" stoves (the Xtreme, Xpert, and Xpedition).  I've seen multiple problems with their connector (the point at which the Powermax canister attaches to the stove).


Basically, the canister has a hex shaped protrusion on it.  The hex is placed into the connector pictured above and rotated 1/6th turn to the right.  As the hex rotates, it causes the inner cam in the photo above to rotate with it while the outer "finger plate" (Coleman's term for it) stays stationary.  The protrusions on the inner cam force the "fingers" on the finger plate to expand and a small ridge on each finger is forced into a grove on the inside rim of the canister's valve assembly.  The fingers when forced by the cam into the grove hold the canister in place such that the lindal valve is depressed, opening the valve and allowing the gas to flow.  If you look closely at this photo, you can see the grove on the inside rim of the canister's valve assembly.

In theory.  In practice, however, the inner cam just wasn't rotating.  Instead, the canister's hex was rotating within the cam, stripping the plastic of the cam.  If you look closely at the photo of the cam, two photos back, you can see some wear where I've stripped the cam.  

"Well," thought I in all my full brilliance,  "the fingers must be too tight, and they're not allowing the cam to rotate properly.  I'll loosen them up a bit."  Crack.  One of the fingers broke off.  Oh, great.  

Well, no problem, I'll just order one from Coleman.  Nope.  Coleman no longer carries either the cam or the fingerplate.  Stumped, I laid the stove aside for a while.

Some time later, I was tipped off that Campmor.com carries "trail maintenance kits" for the Coleman "X" stoves.  The best deal is the Xpedition trail maintenance kit:  it has more parts (and for a lower price) than the other kits.  All of the kits are interchangeable even though some of the kits are labeled for one of the three "X" stoves or another.  A bit expensive to buy an entire kit for just the finger plate, but having no other alternative, I bought a couple.

Here in this photo, you can see the difference between a nice, new cam and a worn cam.

But no dice.  The derned thing still won't turn.   I tried oil.  I tried swapping parts out for new parts.  I tried powdered graphite.  Nothing I tried worked.  The cam just wouldn't turn.  I admit that at this point I just about binned the danged thing.  

Now, fast forward some months.  New Year's day 2011 is fast approaching.  Now, we've something of a local tradition hereabouts, it's called the Rose Parade, which is a nationally televised event.  As part of that parade, the US Air Force usually does a relatively low altitude fly by over the parade route.  Lately, it's been the B-2 Stealth Bomber.  Fascinating!  There's a mountain that has a commanding view of the parade route.  The last several years, quite a crowd has gathered upon the mountain top so as to have quite the view of the B-2 as it flies by.  It's become an event in its own right, with people bringing stoves, cooking, and having quite the festive occasion.  Well, if one wants to cook for a crowd AND one has to carry the stove up a mountainside, what better stove than a two burner Coleman Xpedition stove?  It's relatively light, yet it has not one but two powerful burners.  I thought, what could it hurt to pull the Xpedition off the shelf and have one more go at fettling?  

Now, take one more look at that last photo.  Note that the protrusions on the cams have sharp, hard right angled edges on them.  What if I beveled them a bit?  I got out a file.  I don't know how well this will show in a photo, but here's a cam after I've beveled the leading edges of the protrusions.


Now, have I just wasted my time yet again?  
NO BY GOLLY I HAVE NOT!!!         

Phew!  That's the best looking flame I've seen in a long time.  The worst part of it of course is after months of time spent and untold frustration, it only took me a few minutes to bevel the edges and have the stove up and running.   It's a fairly simple fettle -- once it occurs to you to try it.  Don't become a stovie if you're not prepared to have a good laugh at yourself once in a while.      

Well, then fettle done, off we go early the next morning.  We've got to make it to the mountain top and be in position before 0800 when the fly by occurs.  I'm carrying about 30 pounds of gear (about 13.5 kg); this will be no fast trek.  My friend calls.  He's running late.   Ack!  Off we go in a bit of a race against time!

It's a fairly cold morning by California standards; there's frost on the ground, indicating that the over night low has been below 32 F (0 C).

The San Gabriel Valley of California, pre-dawn.


Here's another view of the greater Los Angeles area from further up the trail a bit later that morning.  If you look closely at the uppermost of the two blimps, you can see the rose colored light of dawn.  Downtown Los Angeles can be seen at the lower right.


Finally, we're in position, and it's nearly 0800.  We've made it in time.  And there it is!  The stealth bomber!


Unfortunately, I couldn't get him in frame when I maximized the zoom level (he was moving too fast), so that's not the best photo in the world, but I assure you it was quite exciting in person.

Here's my set up on the mountain top after the crowds have departed.  I made hot water for instant oatmeal and instant cocoa for folks.  The Xpedition did an admirable job of it.


The pots are 0.9 L and 1.5 L Primus LiTech kettles.  Very convenient to pour from.  By having two burners and two kettles, I could serve with one while heating more with the other, allowing me to provide hot water to a fair number of people.

The canteen seen at left is an orginal Swiss military one produced by Sigg.  Sigg recently issued a retro version made of steel with a screw top.  I saw one go recently for about $75.00 on eBay!    I bought the original version for $7.13 total, and mine is lighter aluminum.  I think I'll stick with my version although a cork stopper is not as secure as a screw top, and I worry I may get water spilled on my pack some day.  I carry it strictly for the cool factor.     

The windscreen you seen in the photo is the concatenation of one and a half Olicamp windscreens.  One and a half windscreens makes an almost perfect fit for the Xpedition.
 

Here's the view from the top.  The signs you see are historical interpretive signs explaining the various features of the site.  The blue you see on the far horizon is the mighty Pacific Ocean.


And now that the crowds have gone, it's my turn to enjoy a cuppa.


And if you look behind me, you can see why so many people have chosen to live in California:  It's January, but it's a beautiful day.  It's cold, there was frost still in the shady spots, but out in the sun a light down jacket like the one you see me wearing was all I needed.  Not too bad for January.

Well, I thank you for joining me on my New Year's Day trip up Echo Mountain.  I hope you've enjoyed the trip -- and the stove.

HJ