Ikia camping stove

I love tinkering and working with my hands, which, when combined with fascination for multiple-use items, sometimes produces interesting results. Recently I’ve found a write-up on homemade camping stove from an Ikea utensil holder. Trying to learn the ways of the Ultra-Light backpacking while combining it with frugality made this project even more appealing and it sounded like something I would enjoy doing myself. So I got all the parts for this project:

1 Person camping kitchen:
Ikea utensil holder      - $3.99
Imusa 12cm mug        - $1.99
2 titanium stakes       - $4.00
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Total:                        - $9.98

The Ikea utensil holder is the smaller of the two available at the store. I’ve cut the top rim off and cut-off a row of holes to make a stand for the stove. Then I’ve cut the holder itself to make room for the handle on the mug and a few large openings to increase airflow to feed the fire. You can use metal shears to cut the holder.
It came out pretty nice and fairly clean.  The stove also works as a holder for the mug and everything fits together snugly. The stand goes inside the mug during periods of non-use.

Here you can see the stove in action. It works very well and the amount of ventilation appears to be adequate to feed the fire efficiently. I still want to enlarge the bottom holes to allow some of the ashes to fall through in order to increase the airflow from below, but all in all – it works well.

I’ve put 24oz of water on the stove (about 60 degrees) and it boiled in 10-11 minutes. That was enough for a cup of tea and a medium sized portion of pasta.

Weight:
Ikea stove                  - 3oz
Imusa 12cm mug         - 3.5oz
2 titanium stakes        - .5 oz
stove support             - .4oz

A few observations:
1 – the stove needs to be used with the largest opening upwind in order not to burn the hands while adding fuel.
2 – the amount of fuel that can be packed at once is good for about 4-5 minutes depending on thickness of twigs and sticks.
3 – the base is not the most stable and I plan on making an improved version that provides better support