We have a charity shop at church; we collect old clothes and stuff and sell them for pence, or often give them away, to refugees and other needy people. You'd be amazed at the anount of rubbish we collect; the smelly old rags go in one garage, and a couple of times a year when it's full we get the ragman to come for them. Junk, and unsaleable not-junk, goes in the other, and periodically we have a skip. So yesterday we were filling the latest skip, and I turned up a hardly-used volcano kettle which had appearently been sitting in the back room for ages.
I'd heard of these things vaguely, and it looked useful, so I took it down to the allotment to try it out. It holds about 2 1/2 pints of water in a water jacket affair, and you light a fire in the middle. So I lit some paper, and fed bits of twigs down the hole, and it boiled the water in no time. If anyone needs something to boil water with on the allotment, these would be well worth looking at. There seem to be plenty of places selling them if you google.
This has made me smile. Do you know, I was only just the other evening reading outloud to OH about these very kettles. It said something about making a smashing cup of tea in the wilderness in a more enviromentally friendly way, which is what got my attention. It took us a while to pick a kettle for our camping trip but now I'm thinking of getting one of these ones. I admit I like the idea of feeding it sticks whilst waiting for it to boil !
Isn't it funny,I hadn't ever seen one before and now heres another one in a only a couple of days!
How strange, I was at the carbooty today and saw and old fashioned camping stove that looked like a large treacle tin with a pop off lid, I think you had to fire it up with meths and poss paraffin, I nearly bought it, I wish I had now :( drat ::)
These caught my eye and may be interesting to those wanting a trip back in time. 8)
http://hem.passagen.se/malena.bjorkell/stoves/stoves_eng/
I was very keen on the Volcano Kettle Robert until I saw the price :o
http://www.nevisport.com/deptlist-12-deptlist_id-166
I spose I could always borrow the electric kettle and plug it into my Genny ;D, sure the Wife wouldn't mind. ;D
It's true they're a bit pricy unless you've got a tame charity shop and strike lucky, but it looks extremely well made and should last forever, almost.
You can get something called the EYDON STORM KETTLE in two sizes a bit pricy but very handy
(http://www.eydonkettle.co.uk/Graphics/Popular.jpg)
I so want one of these.... but the prices seem to be around £40-£50. Would anyone know where I could pick up one cheaper?
Seems like an excellent idea to me!
Try eBay.
Ohhhhh! I haven't seen one of those for about 20 years, that really brings back memories. My grandad used to have one and used to send us collecting twigs for it.
I think someone was using one in the 3rd episode of The Big Dig before it got scrapped.
I am keeping an eye out in charity shops (seen one there before, didn't know what it was - d**n!) and other cheap places. Too pricey new, seeing as an ordinary camping kettle is only a few quid!
This is a great idea. I have a normal camping kettle but would prefer this.
Ebay are around £35-£45, so will keep searching.
Thanks for the idea, I've just ordered a new one for cuppas up at the plot, we're doing 2 weeks in the highlands of Scotland next June so it'll come in useful for that too
I find I can boil a couple of pints of water with 3-4 dry sticks, it's extremely efficient. It's not so good in the horrible wet weather we've been having, but a shed with a roof which didn't leak would make a differece there! I couldn't keep the sticks properly dry.
Thought these looked interesting and did a search, found this on an army surplus site, looked like a bargin, not designed for burning any old thing, but cheap and with a cup
http://www.surplusandadventure.com/ishop/800/shopscr3079.html