Reviews > Cook Gear > Stoves > Snow Peak GigaPower Titanium GST-100 > Owner Review by Roger Caffin

Owner Review for Snow Peak (Titanium) GS(T)-100 Stove
Roger Caffin
Updated 5-Aug-2005

Snow Peak (Titanium) GST-100 Stove

Product description:

This is a small but quite expensive stove for screw-on butane/propane gas cartridges with the Lindal valve. It features a titanium burner for strength and light weight, although the lower body is aluminium, brass and stainless steel. A cheaper version exists: the GS-100, using stainless steel in place of the titanium and weighing 3.25 oz (92 gm). The GS-100 is otherwise identical to the GST-100 and functions just the same. It is shown in the picture above.

It has four folding wire arms with serrations on them. The serrations serve to prevent pots from sliding off, and are fairly effective. The control is actuated by a fold-out spring wire handle. Internally, the valve stem has two O-rings to seal the gas in. This appears to be a safety feature: some other stoves have only one O-ring.

A strong plastic case is provided with the stove and weighs only 22 gm (0.8 oz). It is just slightly larger than the folded stove, such that the stove fits easily inside when folded.

On the side of the box the manufacturer specifies the stove as having a "heat output" of 10,000 BTU. This is not a meaningful specification: I suspect a translation problem. It should be a power output of 10,000 BTU/hr (2.93 kW).

The package also specifies that "This stove can only be used with Snow Peak's fuel canister. Use of other canisters nullifies the warranty." However, it uses the standard screw-thread gas cartridge. I have been advised that to meet official safety standards around the world any such gas stove must work properly with all matching gas cartridges. In my opinion (as a non-lawyer!), Snow Peak's caveat would be invalid. I use any matching cartridge with confidence. In fact, I have never even seen a Snow Peak cartridge being sold in Australia (but others have).

Field information

I was given this stove while writing a stove review for a walking magazine: it is unlikely that I would have bought it given the price it was selling for in Australia at the time. It was in fact being marketed as a very 'up-market' unit (that means the price was very high!). Looking at the Snow Peak web site I found that current USA price is way below the Australian price of the time, and is now quite reasonable.

However, it turned out to be very easy to use, and is now my standard stove for all extended trips other than ski touring. I normally carry it in the plastic case provided, just to keep it safe from impact and any dirt. The extra 22 gm is acceptable. To use it, I drop it out of the case, screw it on the cartridge, open the four pot-stands supports, turn it on and light it. The spring-wire handle pops out automatically due to its cunning design. Assembly takes me little more time to do than it takes you to read about it. It can be turned up to a good roar for boiling water, and it can also be turned down to a very slow simmer. The pot stand diameter is 100 mm (4"). My Trangia kettle is 150 mm (6") in diameter and my normal 180 mm (7") cooking pot (for the two if us) is 180 mm (7"). The stove supports both the kettle and the pot very well. The things on top of the pot are my SIGG Billy Grips: they hold the lid down as well as being useful for picking the pot up when it is hot. Incidentally, the slight roar the burner makes is due to the propane present in the gas: the burner design is a 'quiet' one, unlike the vortex burner on many liquid fuel stoves.

Much is made of peak power output or boiling time by some manufacturers. "My stove boils a litre of water faster than your stove." This is, in my opinion, a stupid subject. While this stove can boil water almost as fast as any of the (many) liquid fuel stoves I own, I value it far more for the ease of starting and the simmer capacity. If one were to stage a race starting with all stoves packaged up, I suspect this (or any other gas stove) could boil a litre of water before a liquid fuel stove had got going properly.

In a nutshell, it is a beautifully made, easy to use, minimalist but complete little gas burner.

Servicing

There is little to go wrong with this stove. A single nut on the valve spindle (right hand short arrow) can be removed to allow the spindle to be screwed out for cleaning and greasing. Two small screws (left hand long arrow) can be removed to give access to the jet, which can also be removed for cleaning. Tools for all these operations are not supplied, but I doubt many would ever need to do either of these jobs in the field. I do service my stoves at home, but it is the liquid fuel stoves which need it, not the gas stoves.

Inspection of the web site shows that Snow Peak has a good range of spare parts available for this stove - not that there are many parts in the stove. In particular, I was pleased to see a spare valve spindle being available. However, I strongly doubt I would ever need to replace the spindle: it is very well made.

Minor negative aspects

While my GST-100 has functioned very well for several years over many trips, it does have three very slightly negative features. None of these is very significant, I hasten to add. I include them here for completeness.

The first is the fold-out handle for the control valve. This folds upwards for packing, which is fine. However, the upwards (folded) position on the handle translates to a slightly open position for the valve. I have to remember to turn the valve off before screwing it onto the cartridge. This is now habit, but the first few times there was an alarming hiss (and smell) as I put the stove on the cartridge. Otherwise the handle works perfectly OK. I note with some amusement that others have complained about exactly this 'feature'. Why couldn't Snow Peak have got it exactly right?

The second problem concerns the two O-rings on the valve spindle. These O-rings are squeezed tightly when the valve is assembled to make a good gas-tight seal. Over time and with the passage of a lot of gas past the inner O-ring the grease on the O-rings migrates away from the bearing surfaces. This leaves the valve with a slight hysteresis in adjustment, which makes getting the lowest gas flow tricky. The solution is quite simple: disassemble the valve (spanner needed), remove the spindle, smear the existing silicone grease around a bit or add a little more, and reassemble. It is then possible to turn the gas flow down to such a low flow that the flame starts to flicker at the burner. This flickering signifies that the gas flow is almost stalling inside the burner. This is really pushing the dynamic range, and indicates excellent burner design. Not many other stoves I have tested can go this low reliably and for a long time - and certainly not my liquid fuel stoves!

The third problem is common to all miniature fold-up gas stoves: it has no radiation shield. This is the round bit of sheet metal found on some larger gas stoves below the burner and which is often incorrectly referred to as a 'windshield'. The function of the radiation shield is to stop the heat radiation from the burner from reaching the gas cartridge and over-heating it during a long cooking session. The danger here is that when the cartridge gets too hot (ie well above something you want to put your hand on) the gas inside starts boiling too fast, the pressure rises too high, and the stove starts to flare or go into over-drive. This could, conceivably, result in a serious accident.

However, the lack of a radiation shield is not a mistake by itself. If all I am doing is boiling some water to make tea and coffee for my wife and myself, the burn time is too short to cause any over-heating of the cartridge. In addition, a bit of thermal feedback is a good thing: it warms the gas up so that the butane does evaporate, along with the propane (see footnote below). However, if I am cooking for a lot longer I may put a home-made radiation shield over the cartridge. This is just a 120 mm (4.5") diameter disk of light gauge aluminium, such as you find in a throw-away alfoil baking dish. It has a slot from the edge to a hole at the centre which lets me slide it across the top of the cartridge while the stove is running. For those who want the very 'best', Snow Peak sell a specially-designed stainless steel radiation shield (GP-008) to go with the stove. I suspect it is heavier than my bit of alfoil; I know it costs a lot more.

Footnote re gas behaviour in the cold

Butane boils at -0.5 C (31 F), while propane boils at -40 C (-40 F). On a very cold day - say around -10 C (14 F), the propane can still boil but the butane will sit there doing nothing very much. As the propane boils off the rest of the liquid gas gets even cooler, by evaporation. Carried too far in the cold the propane gets all used up and the cartridge is left with lots of butane but not giving any gas out. This is why some people think gas stoves don't work in the snow: they simply haven't managed their stove properly.

Summary

Would we buy another? I think so. The Australian price would be the only constraint, so I would probably buy it through the web.

Addendum 2004

My wife and I took this stove to Europe in 2004 for an eight week walking trip along the Pyrenees, and we relied totally on it for all meals. In general I was only able to buy the rather tall 450 g gas canisters, not the lower 220 g ones. The stove performed flawlessly for the whole trip, as indeed it has done since I got the stove in the first place. For stability I always use the stove on a base consisting of a small square of 3-ply about 200 mm (8 ") square. Despite the height of the 470 g canister the combination proved reasonably stable and I had no accidents, just nice meals. I did put some silicone O-ring grease on the O-rings before we left; I did not have to service the O-rings during the trip. The stove is just above my wife's feet in the picture below, with our Trangia kettle on it.

Biographical information

I started bushwalking (the Australian term) when I was about 14 yrs old, took up rock climbing and remote exploration walking at University, later on took up ski touring and canyoning. These days I do all my trips with just my wife. Our preferred walking trips in Australia are long ones: about a week in the general Blue Mts (east coast of Australia) and Snowy Mts (alpine) regions, and up to two months long in Europe and the UK. We favour fairly hard technical trips and prefer to travel fast and light. Our ski touring trips are usually 5-7 days long as well, with full packs and tents. In between we still do fairly long day trips: it's a form of relaxation. Having discovered that a 20 kg pack (44 lb) is no longer fun, I have become a believer in ultra-lightweight walking. Typically I carry an ultra-lightweight tent (we need full insect proofing here), a Thermarest (10 hours asleep on it!), a lightweight sleeping bag, a lightweight butane/propane stove (the subject of this review), a lightweight pack, light climbing rope (frequently used) and a very light parka. I would carry about 12-13 kg (26-29 lb) total for a week (more when skiing of course).

I am also the maintainer of the aus.bushwalking FAQ web site http://www.bushwalking.org.au/FAQ/.

Reviews > Cook Gear > Stoves > Snow Peak GigaPower Titanium GST-100 > Owner Review by Roger Caffin