PowerSwitch

The excellent Aprovecho organisation published an informative book and the full CAD plans for efficient tested rocket stoves.

I think it's well worth considering building one of these to cook a stew on the patio in an emergency.

http://aprovecho.org/publications-3/

There are a few sites on the web which show "rocket stoves" which are nothing like anything Aprovecho would call a rocket stove. Many are of welded steel with no insulation at all. These will not generate temperatures high enough to burn cleanly and at high efficiency. They seem quite popular though. They will also burn through quite quickly.

I had a try of my two wood burning emergency stoves last weekend as a 'winter' and one was found wanting. It was a small 'pocket' design made out of steel plates that could be assembled and then lit. It smoked literally everywhere, didn't burn well and was useless at heating and unstable.
The other design was more of a 'tent stove' as described and was great. It had a five section chimney and a little door to close up. The smoke was kept well away from user level and in fact it worked so well that if I lived a bit more in the countryside I would install one permanently on my verandah for outdoor cooking on raining days.

Wood used was dried offcuts from pruning trees in the garden.

In summary...

RUBBISH



GREAT

That's not really a rocket stove, it's just a portable wood stove.

I would post a picture of my version of a rocket stove pot boiler which worked well for a few years before the weather demolished it but the image hosting site which I used to use seems to have stopped working. Anyone got a link to a site that I can use, please?