Many thank to all of you for your input and ideas. This is the JRA at its best: people coming together to try and help each other.

Asmat I know Nick’s system well. I really don’t want to have to go back to kero - that is a last resort - I like the fact that I can cook on bio ethanol. I’ve spent several years cooking on this sort of Primus: yes, you can produce meals, but it’s not a pleasure cooking in this way. As you say, the temperature is controlled by reducing the pressure, so when you want to simmer, you have to let off a lot of pressure. It’s a bit hit and miss and far too often the flame gets just that bit too cool and all of a sudden you have a sooty, orange, smelly flame instead of your nice, clean, blue one. I enjoy cooking. I don’t want to cook like this. Trangia are a possibility, but the tanks are small and I’d somehow have to make a cooker to hold them. I am no metal worker, and to be honest, I just want to buy a damn cooker that works. Call me entitled, but that doesn’t seem to me to be too much to ask! Unfortunately, I really enjoy my food, so Bill King’s solution wouldn’t suit me, although it would save me a lot of grief and money!

Arne sadly, yes, I’m certain it’s a genuine Origo stove. I’m sure they usually last for years and I’m sure it’s my fault because I have the burners lit for too long a period of time because I am such a slow cook. And, of course, I’ve cooked around 2,000 meals on them, which is an awful lot of cooking compared to if you just have coffee and corn flakes in the morning and cook two meals on your weekend away.

I must go back and check on your modified burner. I stopped watering the alcohol - someone suggested that this might be responsible for the corrosion (which, obviously, has been happening for some time), hence the dirty pots.

Paul I really, really appreciate your feedback about the Salsa/Mamba. I’ve been following your blog and see that you and Toni enjoy cooking, so if you reckon that cooker is inadequate, I shall take that as a fact.

David’s discovery is fascinating. The cookers look to be beautifully and robustly made, but I’m not sure how I would contrive them in my galley. I have no idea about working with metal and no facilities. Anyway, I have asked David to design me a cooker for FanShi as he was already intrigued by the concept. I reckon he has three years to perfect it because ...

Graeme  has miraculously found an affordable Origo in NZ - and bought it on my behalf, bless him. So I now have two more tanks and when I’ve managed to destroy them, I’m hoping someone (David T???) will have created a genuine, seagoing, liveaboard alcohol cooker.

Hi Annie I would have thought a good sheet metal worker would be able to repair something like that. But not having seen it and not having yet used the Origo I purchased near new a couple of years ago, I guess that is easy to say.

As we both know, Origos are as scarce as hen’s teeth in NZ and you rarely see them for sale.

However, you may be in luck.

Just by chance (I have been keeping a watch for the last 18 months) one of these was advertised on Trademe just this afternoon. It is in Tauranga, and I am currently not too far away from there at this moment. It was opening bids at $80 with a “buy now” of $150. If bidding starts, the buy now no longer applies, and I would expect bidding to reach more than $150 so, to cut a long story short: I saw it just minutes after reading your post, and decided on impulse to secure it immediately, by way of the $150 “buy now”.

The “fuel tanks” look OK in the photo.

If you think that will solve your problem, I can pass it on to you when I get back to Auckland. I am not sure whether or not it is a genuine Origo, but it may well be and if so, probably a bargain. No obligation, I am sure I can easily find someone else who would want it – you can have a look and have first option if you like.

(It's here if you want to have a closer look. I wouldn't mind keeping the gimbal arrangements and the pot-holder, which mine doesn't have, if you don't mind. They look to be home-made and added on, anyway.)

A while ago, I tried my hardest to create a home-workshop version of the Maxie alcohol burner, which was similar in operation to the Salsa/Mamba type, but more powerful, though not particularly long-lasting - and failed. I never liked the Origo burner, but remain convinced that alcohol is the most suitable fuel for cooking aboard. I liked the Trangia type for ultralight backpacking, but couldn't see how to make it suitable for long term use aboard. 

Now, with Annie's problem in mind, I looked at the current market situation. As usual one has to go to China for innovation and entrepreneurship. I found this, which might just point to a way forward: a lightly pressurised alcohol tank supplying a vaporising burner.

Not too expensive, and seems to come in versions that might be re-engineered to fit into a fiddle-railed/gimballed kind of scenario. I think I'll order one, and see how well it works. Not for my own use, as I'm now ashore for good, but just to keep me amused and occupied.

Hi Annie,

sorry to see your Origo in such a desastrous shape!

As you mentioned the Salsa/Mamba: We have been using our Salsa now daily for over 3 months, cooking every day - definitely not only warming up instant noodles. As you mentioned, it has only 1 kW. It really is not that much, we are often looking forward to cook decently when back on land - which is a pitty! As I wrote earlier, the first 10 minutes are about fine, they give enough power. Afterwards, you are training your patience while cooking - not to speak about roasting! As far as I understand from your vegetarian sailing food blog (which both of us enjoy a lot!), this burner would probably not be sufficient for your needs...

Cheers,

Paul

I'm appalled to see those origo burners corroding like that. I'd have a look at Trangia camping cook sets. I've no idea of the burner power of those, except to say they are slow to boil water, compared with paraffin burners.

I keep seeing Primus stoves being sold for fair prices on ebay. If you can make do without adjustable, self pricking burners, that may be an answer. Nick Skeates gave up on those ages ago and "Wylo" carries a pair of Primuses on a swinging rack.You need a good supply of prickers and burner power may be reduced by de-pressurising the fuel tank. Spare burners seem to be readily available at a reasonable price and the only other spares you'll need are leather cup washers for the pumps, which cost next to nothing.

The only other solution I can think of is the one adopted by Bill King in "Galway Blazer". He never cooked anything and like the horses of that name, seemed to thrive on a diet consisting largely of oats and water, eaten cold.