Post by thread:[OT] Brilliant DIY Camp Stove

A luscious find from StumbleUpon. Alcohol powered portable camp stove, made from three empty Heineken cans and a penny! EXTREMELY well thought out. Human ingenuity at its finest. Includes (if you can find it) a list of possible fuels with benefits and drawbacks of each. http://www.csun.edu/~mjurey/penny.html# I fully intend to build one just as soon as I can lay hands on some Heinekens. Or maybe just as soon as the effects of emptying the cans wears off. Mike H.

>-----Original Message----- >From: spam_OUTpiclist-bouncesTakeThisOuTmit.edu [.....piclist-bouncesKILLspam@spam@mit.edu] >Sent: 02 December 2005 09:43 >To: 'Microcontroller discussion list - Public.' >Subject: RE: [OT] Brilliant DIY Camp Stove > > >Did you actually find the instructions? I couldn't find one on >the site unless I missed something obvious. (entirely possible). > >Joe It took me a little while to work out (not good web design IMO). If you click on the "Making the penny alcohol stove" link from the main page it brings up a pop-up window with a picture of the stove heating cooking pot. Under the picture are a row of circles. Click the circles to bring up each of the construction pictures. Regards Mike ======================================================================= This e-mail is intended for the person it is addressed to only. The information contained in it may be confidential and/or protected by law. If you are not the intended recipient of this message, you must not make any use of this information, or copy or show it to any person. Please contact us immediately to tell us that you have received this e-mail, and return the original to us. Any use, forwarding, printing or copying of this message is strictly prohibited. No part of this message can be considered a request for goods or services. =======================================================================

> I fully intend to build one just as soon as I > can lay hands on some Heinekens. Or > maybe just as soon as the effects of > emptying the cans wears off. It works as advertised. I used 100% ethanol- about 10 ml gave me about 5 min run time, including the prime and the copious amount I spilled on the table next to the stove. Super easy to assemble. I might carry a largish syringe with a long flat-tipped needle to "inject" a little more fuel into the stove for real-world usage, though. Mike H.

On 12/2/05, Michael Rigby-Jones <Michael.Rigby-JonesKILLspambookham.com> wrote: > > > > >Did you actually find the instructions? I couldn't find one on > >the site unless I missed something obvious. (entirely possible). > > It took me a little while to work out (not good web design IMO). If you click on the "Making the penny alcohol stove" link from the main page it brings up a pop-up window with a picture of the stove heating cooking pot. Under the picture are a row of circles. Click the circles to bring up each of the construction pictures. Oh good, I'm not the only one who found the website hard to nagivate! Especially when I'm using Firefox with tabs, and it's resizing my whole browser. How rude! Once I realized that the lines where to cut were done on 3 separate cans, it made more sense. The image implies that you cut all of the pieces from one can. I thought the '3 cans' were just a joke about how many it takes. But it is a very cool idea and I'm going to try it over the holidays. Alex

Alex wrote regarding 'Re: [OT] Brilliant DIY Camp Stove' on Fri, Dec 02 at 09:24: > Oh good, I'm not the only one who found the website hard to nagivate! > Especially when I'm using Firefox with tabs, and it's resizing my > whole browser. How rude! Go to Tools->options. Click on "Web Features" and then click the "Advanced" button next to "enable javascript". Uncheck "move or resize existing windows" (and hide/change status bar text as well as raise/lower windows, IMHO) --Danny

Peter wrote: > > Click on "Making the Penny Alcohol Stove" in the page > http://www.csun.edu/~mjurey/penny.html#. You have to have > Flash/Shockwave enabled. As was stated, "poor web page design". This wasn't a case where Flash/Shockwave would add anything to the information content. Fact is, the design of the stove was an order of magnitude better than the design of the web page. The stove works. The web page sort of kind of limps along. It's hard to get to the instructions. The instructions that appear are not very precise. I can't (easily/economically) print the instructions. Dave

On Dec 2, 2005, at 11:50 AM, David Minkler wrote: > The stove works. The web page sort of kind of limps along. See also www.pcthiker.com/pages/gear/pepsistove.shtml so you won't have to drink any beer :-) The instructions look a lot better, though it lacks a bit of the elegance that stems from the unusually-shaped heineken cans, and I'm not sure that it's the same "kind" of alcohol stove. Googling for 'soda can alcohol stove' turns up a lot of results. It seems to be the camping equivalent of blinking an LED :-) BillW

On Fri, 2 Dec 2005, David Minkler wrote: > Peter wrote: >> Click on "Making the Penny Alcohol Stove" in the page >> http://www.csun.edu/~mjurey/penny.html#. You have to have Flash/Shockwave >> enabled. > > As was stated, "poor web page design". This wasn't a case where > Flash/Shockwave would add anything to the information content. Fact is, the > design of the stove was an order of magnitude better than the design of the > web page. The stove works. The web page sort of kind of limps along. It's > hard to get to the instructions. The instructions that appear are not very > precise. I can't (easily/economically) print the instructions. Get used to it. It's due to people ripping images and pages from other sites. The difficulty in printing and copying is deliberate in most cases. It's called AJAX ... Peter

Peter wrote: {Quote hidden}> > On Fri, 2 Dec 2005, David Minkler wrote: > >> Peter wrote: >> >>> Click on "Making the Penny Alcohol Stove" in the page >>> http://www.csun.edu/~mjurey/penny.html#. You have to have >>> Flash/Shockwave enabled. >> >> >> As was stated, "poor web page design". This wasn't a case where >> Flash/Shockwave would add anything to the information content. Fact >> is, the design of the stove was an order of magnitude better than the >> design of the web page. The stove works. The web page sort of kind >> of limps along. It's hard to get to the instructions. The >> instructions that appear are not very precise. I can't >> (easily/economically) print the instructions. > > > Get used to it. It's due to people ripping images and pages from other > sites. The difficulty in printing and copying is deliberate in most > cases. It's called AJAX ... > > Peter I still don't "get it". I understand people not wanting to have their work stolen. I understand incompetence. I'm not suggesting that he's incompetent, quite the opposite. I think he got carried away with making a really spiffy web site and forgot that the purpose of the average viewer was to gather information adequate to reconstruct his creation (the stove, not the web site). If we look at other parts of this guy's site, it's clear he knows the rudiments. It's also clear that he's (justifiably) proud of his stove design. Clearly, he's not trying to hide information on how to build his stove. Instead of having simple links to clear instructions however, he has this Flash/Shockwave nonsense that makes it difficult to get to his instructions in the first place. Then he has a nice photo of a can, from the wrong angle, with lines to indistinct locations on the can and few real dimensions in sight. No exploded view anywhere. The viewer can't even easily take measurements from a print because he has made it difficult to print. Yes, I know how to circumvent all the nonsense but much of his target audience probably doesn't. I still think the stove design was at least an order of magnitude better than the web design. I think he should have taken advantage of his last name and called it the "Jurey Rigged Stove". Dave

> I still think the stove design was at least an order of magnitude better > than the web design. I think he should have taken advantage of his last > name and called it the "Jurey Rigged Stove". I've never liked that term. Jerry rigged came into use AFAICT around WWI or WWII when we didn't want to think of the germans as nice folk. My grandmother used a similar term that was directed at African Americans. So I just avoid it altogether. Why not just say improvised?

David wrote regarding 'Re: [OT] Brilliant DIY Camp Stove' on Mon, Dec 05 at 11:51: > difficult to print. Yes, I know how to circumvent all the nonsense but > much of his target audience probably doesn't. Tha'ts the real kicker. If an image can be displayed by a web browser, I *can* download it / save it. That's just the way it is. So why do people continue on with these misguided attempts to make it a pain in the butt to use their sites? The only real protection they have is Copyright, and that applies whether the site's a monstrosity of non-standard crap, or the pinnicle of W3C compliance. --Danny, most certainly *not* getting used to bad design :)

I thought the original was Jury Rigged. Now, if only I could find that etymology link Russell posted ... Dave David Van Horn wrote: {Quote hidden}>>I still think the stove design was at least an order of magnitude >> >> >better > > >>than the web design. I think he should have taken advantage of his >> >> >last > > >>name and called it the "Jurey Rigged Stove". >> >> > >I've never liked that term. Jerry rigged came into use AFAICT around >WWI or WWII when we didn't want to think of the germans as nice folk. >My grandmother used a similar term that was directed at African >Americans. >So I just avoid it altogether. > >Why not just say improvised? > > > > >

David wrote regarding 'RE: [OT] Brilliant DIY Camp Stove' on Mon, Dec 05 at 12:19: > > I still think the stove design was at least an order of magnitude > better > > than the web design. I think he should have taken advantage of his > last > > name and called it the "Jurey Rigged Stove". > > I've never liked that term. Jerry rigged came into use AFAICT around > WWI or WWII when we didn't want to think of the germans as nice folk. That's a semi-common misconception. The term "jury rigged" came from the installation of a "jury mast" to replace a broken mast, therefore "jury rigging" the ship. The term appears in Robinson Crusoe, which was written in 1719. Germans were referred to as Jerries in WW I, however, jerry-built was in use in the mid-1800s. Historians disagree as to whether it referred to a chamber pot, "Jelly", the tumbling walls of Jericho, or earlier disdainful uses of "jerry" to refer to a disreputable person / cheap pub) but they generally agree that it didn't have anything to do with the Germans - since the term "jerry-built" was around for many years before the German slang term. "Jerry rig" is typically regarded as a mix of "jury rig" and "jerry built". Dictionaries are divided as to whether they include it (since 1959) or not (because it's a mis-form of the two proper terms). The term appropriately used above, and which probably sounds like "Jurey" is "Jury-rigged", anyway, so this is all somewhat irrelevant. :) Never mind that, should someone call me a "Jerry" due to my German last name, I'd laugh at their lame attempt at a racial slur. At least "Kraut" conveys a bad smell - "Jerry" doesn't even sound like a mean person. :) It's right up there with "Cracker" in the list of amusingly ineffective racial slurs, IMHO. The African-derogatory term, however, is probably best to avoid in general. There's not much dispute on that one... --Danny, basing this on several sources, all uncited ;)

Wow. Just like I've always said, "If you stay awake, you learn something new every day." It's rarely what I expected to learn but, that's okay. Thanks, Dave Danny Sauer wrote: {Quote hidden}>David wrote regarding 'RE: [OT] Brilliant DIY Camp Stove' on Mon, Dec 05 at 12:19: > > >>>I think he should have taken advantage of his last name and called it the "Jurey Rigged Stove". >>> >>> >>I've never liked that term. Jerry rigged came into use AFAICT around >>WWI or WWII when we didn't want to think of the germans as nice folk. >> >> > >That's a semi-common misconception. The term "jury rigged" came from >the installation of a "jury mast" to replace a broken mast, therefore >"jury rigging" the ship. The term appears in Robinson Crusoe, which >was written in 1719. ><snip> > >

> I just wanted to point out that it comes from a bad neighborhood, and I > just avoid it because of that. There's too many threads in this thread. Are you talking about "Jerry Rigged" or Flash? As pointed out earlier "Jerry Rigged" was a phrase before WWI which makes the argument that it is somehow pejoritive pointless. I think that the movement to remove everything that offends somebody somewhere is rather strange. A case in point: I was working for Penn State developing an inter-university image sharing application geared towards agriculture. While I was the lead programmer, I had to interface with the higher-ups who were in charge. At one meeted we got into content. It was decided that since Inda had a high Hindu population that we couldn't have any pictures involving the butchering of cows. 1. Butchering of cows, while not my thing, was important to the ag program. 2. At the time this was decided, no Indian university had signed onto this program. 3. There had been no actual complaints or input from any Hindu person or church. In other words, it was preemptive political correctness. -- D. Jay Newman ! _Linux Robotics: Building Smarter Robots_ .....jayKILLspam.....sprucegrove.com ! To be released soon to unsuspecting bookstores http://enerd.ws/robots/ ! everywhere.

> > I just wanted to point out that it comes from a bad neighborhood, and I > > just avoid it because of that. > > Agreed. I usually avoid any slang terms whose etymology I don't know. > I'd hate to accidentally insult someone through my ignorance. > > Mike H. So in other words you make the decision about what *might* be offensive to *somebody*. I prefer to use what language I use (generally polite) and if I offend somebody through my ignorance of slang or jargon, I will mend my ways if *they* complain. I refuse to judge what other people will find offensive. -- D. Jay Newman ! _Linux Robotics: Building Smarter Robots_ EraseMEjayspam_OUTTakeThisOuTsprucegrove.com ! To be released soon to unsuspecting bookstores http://enerd.ws/robots/ ! everywhere.

> > I just wanted to point out that it comes from a bad neighborhood, and I > > just avoid it because of that. > > There's too many threads in this thread. Are you talking about "Jerry > Rigged" or Flash? The former, flash is always evil :) > As pointed out earlier "Jerry Rigged" was a phrase before WWI which makes > the argument that it is somehow pejoritive pointless. I think that the > movement to remove everything that offends somebody somewhere is rather > strange. Well, in MY mind, "jury rigged" is too close to the racially insulting terms. I'm not offended when someone uses the "jury rigged" form though.

> So in other words you make the decision about what *might* be > offensive to *somebody* But people do that all the time now in this PC-gone-mad world. You could probably cite examples all day "At one meeted we got into content. It was decided that since India had a high Hindu population that we couldn't have any pictures involving the butchering of cows" Some British banks no longer give away "piggy banks" because they might offend someone. My answer would be don't give one to somebody who would be offended. Duh Christmas is being watered-down in case it offends (I noted a story in the news yesterday about a family "ordered" to remove a nativity scene from their own garden). Christmas is re-named in some places, decorations are frowned upon etc etc. A proposal to use CE (Common Era) instead of AD, in case the "Domini" offends Someone. Somewhere. Sometime Yet it seems to me that those who might be offended scarcely return the courtesy and continue their own practices that do offend As for etymology, look up "berk". Often used as a mild oath, (along the lines of "clot" or "twit"). Apparently fine to use "berk" in just about any social context, but don't you dare use its source !!!

> Well, in MY mind, "jury rigged" is too close to the racially insulting > terms. I'm not offended when someone uses the "jury rigged" form > though. But that's in your head Dave. It's like saying that you shouldn't use the word "whittler" around people who lived in Poland in WW2 It's exactly the kind of misplaced emotionalism and misinterpretation that started all this PC crap (no offense intended ;-))) ) http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-jur1.htm "These three terms have got thoroughly mixed up in people's minds, to the extent that we may never be able to disentangle them again"

> > But that's in your head Dave. It's like saying that you shouldn't > > use the word "whittler" around people who lived in Poland in > > WW2 > > And it's in my mind that the damage would probably be. Hmmm, while there's no need to be intentionally insensitive or provocative, I'd still use words that are etymologically correct For example, I refuse to say "spokesperson" if the gender of the person is known I will never use "womyn" because some angry women don't understand the "man" part of woman. Ditto "manual" labour I will not stop using "balls up", because it has nothing to do with what you might think it does. It is a perfectly legitimate non-swearing phrase Instead of me dumbing down my use of language, how about others educate themselves and not be so reactionary ? Exactly what I was saying before - it's always so one-way

> > But that's in your head Dave. It's like saying that you shouldn't use > > the word "whittler" around people who lived in Poland in WW2 > > And it's in my mind that the damage would probably be. Then it is *your* responsibility to let people know of your own problems. Part of living in a society is to learn to deal with *some* irritation from other people. For example, if I considered the eating of spinach to be a horrendous sin, I feel that I should remove myself from such situations. On the other hand, I feel I have a right to be insulted if somebody deliberately blows smoke in my face in an otherwise normal social situation. -- D. Jay Newman ! _Linux Robotics: Building Smarter Robots_ jayspam_OUTsprucegrove.com ! To be released soon to unsuspecting bookstores http://enerd.ws/robots/ ! everywhere.

Jinx wrote: > Dave Van Horn wrote: >> Well, in MY mind, "jury rigged" is too close to the racially insulting >> terms. I'm not offended when someone uses the "jury rigged" form >> though. > > But that's in your head Dave. It's like saying that you shouldn't use > the word "whittler" around people who lived in Poland in WW2 I'm not sure about how others feel, but in any case I don't know a single German who would know that "jerry-rigged" has anything to do with being German (I didn't, and since I lived for a time in the USA, I have a more than average exposure to US slang) -- and much less would feel insulted by it. On the other side, the claimed extraordinary capacity of "jerry-rigging" just about anything (they just call it differently) is a substantial part of Brazilian national pride... Now I could understand how some could be offended by talking about a "rigged jury", but then removing this expression from the language would be downright dangerous :) Gerhard

> Well, in MY mind, "jury rigged" is too close to the racially insulting > terms. I'm not offended when someone uses the "jury rigged" form > though. If you get down to it, many terms that we use in normal life were offensive at one time. One thing I find highly amusing is the reoccurance of the word "frigging" as a "polite" version of the normal "f*ck". I find this amusing because "frigging" is a *much* harsher word than the word it is used to replace. -- D. Jay Newman ! _Linux Robotics: Building Smarter Robots_ KILLspamjayKILLspamsprucegrove.com ! To be released soon to unsuspecting bookstores http://enerd.ws/robots/ ! everywhere.

Gerhard, On Mon, 5 Dec 2005 20:05:45 -0200, Gerhard Fiedler wrote: {Quote hidden}> Jinx wrote: > > > Dave Van Horn wrote: > >> Well, in MY mind, "jury rigged" is too close to the racially insulting > >> terms. I'm not offended when someone uses the "jury rigged" form > >> though. > > > > But that's in your head Dave. It's like saying that you shouldn't use > > the word "whittler" around people who lived in Poland in WW2 > > I'm not sure about how others feel, but in any case I don't know a single > German who would know that "jerry-rigged" has anything to do with being > German (I didn't, and since I lived for a time in the USA, I have a more > than average exposure to US slang) -- and much less would feel insulted by > it. But that isn't even the expression - there's "jury rigged" which is a 400-year-old expression describing fixing an emergency mast on a boat, and "jerry built" which relates to a poor building technique, apparently from the mid-1800s, and supposedly to do with an infamous building firm in Liverpool (in North East England). Neither of them is racial (or in fact "national") in their target, and to avoid one because the other one may possibly offend someone to whom it doesn't apply seems pretty daft to me! People will start objecting to "Murphy's Law" next because it's a slur on the Irish... (For the record, Murphy was American, and he coined the phrase himself!). All of this is in my opinion, of course. Cheers, Howard Winter St.Albans, England

> For example, if I considered the eating of spinach to be a > horrendous sin, I feel that I should remove myself from > such situations If, like most people, you view molestation as an horrendous sin, then how would you react to being told that a man cannot sit next to an unaccompanied child on an airplane and you have to sit somewhere else, whether you wanted to or not ? Whilst I appreciate (but dislike) why the airlines have this policy for men in general, it still sucks at the personal level, because by moving a particular individual, that is tantamount to baselessly saying that a particular individual is in fact a molester. I'm so glad a case has been filed with the Human Rights Commission So you see, PC has become so comprehensively embedded that one is no longer able to make all the choices one used to or go about one's normal innocent business. I detest it

> > For example, if I considered the eating of spinach to be a > > horrendous sin, I feel that I should remove myself from > > such situations > > If, like most people, you view molestation as an horrendous > sin, then how would you react to being told that a man cannot > sit next to an unaccompanied child on an airplane and you have > to sit somewhere else, whether you wanted to or not ? I vew molestation to be horrible. However, I would protest such a request (demand) for anybody but a convicted child molester. > Whilst I appreciate (but dislike) why the airlines have this policy > for men in general, it still sucks at the personal level, because by The interesting thing is that I've heard that women are more likely to be molesters than men. This could be because women have more access. > So you see, PC has become so comprehensively embedded that > one is no longer able to make all the choices one used to or go > about one's normal innocent business. I detest it I think that this is more about fear than about PC. The media and the US government seem to run on this fear. -- D. Jay Newman ! _Linux Robotics: Building Smarter Robots_ RemoveMEjayTakeThisOuTsprucegrove.com ! To be released soon to unsuspecting bookstores http://enerd.ws/robots/ ! everywhere.

> On Mon, 5 Dec 2005 17:06:24 -0500 (EST), D. Jay Newman wrote: > > > One thing I find highly amusing is the reoccurance of the word "frigging" > > as a "polite" version of the normal "f*ck". > > I'm not clear whether you realise that that *isn't* what it means? And in the UK it certainly isn't > appropriate in polite company! I'm sorry; I thought it was obvious that "frigging" is *much* worse than the word it "replaces". -- D. Jay Newman ! _Linux Robotics: Building Smarter Robots_ spamBeGonejayspamBeGonesprucegrove.com ! To be released soon to unsuspecting bookstores http://enerd.ws/robots/ ! everywhere.

> I vew molestation to be horrible. However, I would protest such a > request (demand) for anybody but a convicted child molester As Flip Wilson said - "Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts and minds of men ? The Shadow do". Airline staff are not The Shadow. If they were, they wouldn't let drug smugglers on board, or would know at a glance who has an infectious disease. Or is having an affair. Who's to say there aren't any molesters working for airlines. If they're men, they "must" be, right ? I think eventually all towns will be called Cottonwoolville and numbered > I think that this is more about fear than about PC. The media and > the US government seem to run on this fear. You're probably right, athough most of this fear is misplaced and irrational, and the reaction to it is be PC. Dare I mention profiling ? And confiscating nail clippers ?

> > I think that this is more about fear than about PC. The media and > > the US government seem to run on this fear. > > You're probably right, athough most of this fear is misplaced and > irrational, and the reaction to it is be PC. Dare I mention profiling ? > And confiscating nail clippers ? Even the government is realizing that it went too far. The US is finally relaxing the items allowable on airplanes. True, not to pre-9-11, but I think a bit of sanity is creeping in. -- D. Jay Newman ! _Linux Robotics: Building Smarter Robots_ RemoveMEjayTakeThisOuTsprucegrove.com ! To be released soon to unsuspecting bookstores http://enerd.ws/robots/ ! everywhere.

On Mon, 5 Dec 2005, Mike Hord wrote: >> I just wanted to point out that it comes from a bad neighborhood, and I >> just avoid it because of that. > > Agreed. I usually avoid any slang terms whose etymology I don't know. > I'd hate to accidentally insult someone through my ignorance. That would require that you restrict your vocabulary to about 500 words, mostly non-dictionary type, and speak slowly and clearly all the time in front of strangers. ;-) Peter

Peter wrote regarding 'Re: [OT] Brilliant DIY Camp Stove' on Dec 06 at 13:24: > On Mon, 5 Dec 2005, Mike Hord wrote: > > >Agreed. I usually avoid any slang terms whose etymology I don't know. > >I'd hate to accidentally insult someone through my ignorance. > > That would require that you restrict your vocabulary to about 500 words, > mostly non-dictionary type, and speak slowly and clearly all the time in > front of strangers. ;-) Sorry, I find people who speak slowly and clearly with a limited vocabulary to be offensive. :) --Danny