Originally Posted by
Tourist in MSN
A few months ago I was in a campsite and saw some guy in the next site feeding little twigs into some tiny little burner for maybe an hour and a half, just constantly looking around for twigs. I thought it odd since there was a prohibition on campfires there, it was a National Park. And, I could not figure out why he did not put the kettle on the fire and get supper started, but instead he just kept trying to stoke the fire. Now I know what he was doing for an hour and a half.
Since it usually takes hours to charge up a phone, I really can't imagine why anyone would want one of those.
And, I wonder which is heavier, a solar power charger capable of powering a USB port or that thing?
I've been intrigued by the BioLite since it came out. I finally got to see one in action at Pigmans Ferry campground on the C&O. Not so intrigued now. The couple who were using it said that it would charge a phone but the output is extremely low. It also has a fan that is needed to provide draft to the burner which is loud and takes a lot of power to run. It's also quite bulky and heavy. It measures 8.25 inches by 5 inches and weighs 2 lb. That's a big unit.
It also seems to be slow on heating even with a pretty good flame running in the unit. It took them most of an hour to boil 4 eggs. By the time that they had their eggs boiled, I had cooked dinner, eaten it, heated water for washing, washed my dishes, put them away and was reading my book. I'll stick with my canister stove.