The Voyage of the Swan
Outfitting: Stove
I don’t like propane on a cruising boat for these reasons:
• It’s heavier than air. If it leaks, your boat can blow up.
• In remote ports, the tanks often need to be left with the supplier
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for days to be filled.
• Fittings vary all over the world.
On the other hand, they say propane is easy to use and burns hot.
However, the ease of use seems to be only on the front end.
Lugging 20 lb. propane tanks around in tropical heat looking
for a vendor isn’t my idea of easy.
I’ve always used kerosene (paraffin) stoves but after our last cruise
we switched to an Origo non-pressurized alcohol stove. Alcohol has
most of the advantages of kerosene, plus it burns cleaner. The
Origo has no piping, no external tank, no pumping and no priming.
It provides only about 60% the BTU’s per pound of propane, but
it can be stored in an ordinary jerry jug so it does not take up as
much space as propane per pound. We store 12 gallons of alcohol in our lazarette in the same space it takes to store eight gallons of propane.
We worried that the burners would not heat as quickly as propane or kerosene, but we’ve found that the Swedish designed burners heat faster than kerosene and at least as fast as propane. We are really happy with this stove.
