Right now, the "prepper" side of my brain is currently leaning towards the "buy more ammunition" side of the spectrum (if only because ammo is something I can use right now), but one must not neglect the other aspects of keeping one’s family and one’s self safe and comfortable during times of emergency (though ammo can always be used as currency as well), and Jason helpfully pointed out that the Biolite stove he pointed me towards is currently available for purchase.
At $130, it is a fair bit above my "impulse purchase" limits, and over triple what I paid for the Coleman "dual fuel" stove
‘Course, if Biolite wanted to send me a stove for test, evaluation, and review purposes from the perspective of someone planning on sheltering in place rather than hiking up Mt. Rainier, I certainly would not mind…
4 W max? (campstove, no specs for homestove)
Must be fairly inefficient.
4 watts won’t do much, really.
According to the Wikipedia, for whatever that is worth, a standard USB port only provides 2.5W, though apparently iPads require 10W (they must have dedicated charging warts or something). In other words, this is more than enough to recharge your phone or other electronic gadgets, which is all it was really designed to do.
And, in the end, it is “free” power, if you are going to have a cooking fire anywise.
Also, some of the power from the thermoelectric couple is used to run the fan to increase the efficiency of the fire, but that cannot be that much.
I already have a woodstove in my house (though my wife’s art studio is piled up around it). I wonder if there is a standalone thermocouple USB-charger wart available that I could strap onto it?
/me Gargles a bit…
Hmmm. This is interesting: A thermoelectric generator with USB ports, built into a pot. Recharge while cooking.
Still a little spendy, but it seems a lot more flexible than the Biolite. One of these plus a Solo Stove seems a really attractive option for SiP and bug-out.
I guess thermocouples are still rather expensive, I hope mass production works its magic on them, too…
I’ve put in a request to BioLite for a review stove, and while they liked the review I did of the other stoves and agree they can use good press, at the time they were unable to provide a review copy (or even a discounted one). If that changes, I will let you know.
@ John Hardin: The only thing about those standalone units is that they probably have a fair bit of mass to them, so the combined weight between them and the Solo might end up being more than the BioLite and a lightweight pot. Dunno.
In any case, cheaper thermocouples would be awesome in a variety of fashions – their efficiencies have never been pushed past 10%, but considering that everything we own/do creates heat, you could be doing all kinds of things with the waste heat from your computer alone, much less your heat pump…
@ Erin Palette: Yeah, unfortunately, the list of people willing to pay full price to buy one of those things is longer than they could satisfy in probably a year’s worth of current production levels, so T&E things are not going to be happening for a while. In any case, Moderno beat us to it, and with a better review than I could have written.