Originally Posted by
Tourist in MSN
Yup. I have had TSA inspect my bike a couple times, it was packed in an S&S case, not a taped up cardboard box. Other times, not inspected.
My last trip on a plane with a bike was to and from Canada. A Canadian inspector looked at the x ray, saw something, asked if I had a camp stove. I said yes, she asked me to dig it out of my case for her to inspect. I did so, she said if she smelled anything on it, she had to confiscate it. She smelled nothing (it was a butane stove), handed it back to me to pack and that was it. Everything passed.
But, I have read that some TSA inspectors just confiscate camp stoves if they are not brand new, no matter how clean they are. The rule says it can't have any residue, so if they see it is discolored from the heat they will assume that is residue. I no longer fly with liquid fuel stoves, too much hassle to clean them well enough to pass a smell test. But more recently when I saw how cheap some of the asian unbranded stoves are, I bought a few cheap stoves to use on trips in the future if I fly, in case it is confiscated. I would rather lose an $8 stove than an $80 stove.
Yeah that's ticked me off for a couple decades. They tried to confiscate mine (used but zero smell, white gas leaves no smell), I was able to get the airline to stash it for a couple weeks until my return. Rules made by people without any investigation, after all, if stoves were a threat (they ban torch lighters but not simple flame butane or zippos), they wouldn't allow NEW stoves still in packaging. If I need to travel with one, I would:
- polish away heat marks on the stainless steel with metal polish or lye-based oven cleaner
- fab a soda can stove to bring along (although performance really suffers with no heat adjustability and 4-5X the boil time)
- like you said, buy and bring a cheapie
Further note:
- California has banned disposable 1 lb propane bottles. The cost of refillables has come down from $50+ to about $20. But I don't think they can be refilled at propane filling stations; You need a 20 lb tank, inverted, and filling adaptor for the 1 lb tank.
- Do NOT ever try to fill a disposable butane/isobutane cartridge with propane; Cartridge stoves can run on propane (from a propane bottle) with an adapter, but the vapor pressure of propane is 3X that of butane and it will probably burst the (orginally butane) cartridge. Some cartridges have a small amount, like 25% propane, so they burn better in cold weather. At Asian food stores here, they have spraypaint-sized cartridges of all butane, used on tabletop stoves by many Asian here; Those can be used on a backpacking butane stove with an adapter, provided it's not too cold out (below freezing) and you rig something to stabilize the tall slender can. Or, they do have adapters to refill wide butane cartridges with that (leaving some airspace, as they have no overfill protection device (OPD). Those skinny butane cartridges, 8 oz, sell for $2 at my local Asian market, and they'll sell singles, elsewhere they are $4-5 either single or in packs. So that's a cheap fuel source, if I can use it. But of course no fuels allowed on airplanes.
White gas is getting increasingly difficult to find, and price has not come down from when it went up to $15-20/gallon well over 10 years ago.