Gas versus spirit

I doubt anyone has done a rigorous survey so it's only going to be opinions of what people have seen from drinking tea on other people's boats. I see mostly gas, occasionally spirit, and even more occasionally some other liquid fuel. Why not do a poll then there would be hard evidence you could show your dubiously informed chum?

Update: I've instigated the world's first on-board cooking fuel post. :)
 
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Haven't a clue on percentages but would guess gas installations are in the high nineties percentage wise. This winters project was removing my paraffin cooker (Taylors) and replacing it with gas.
 
I can't possibly guess.

However, being being of a social disposition, I have many friends with boats and I can only think of three that don't have gas cookers. Two have Taylor's paraffin cookers and the other has an Origo

I would like a Taylor's paraffin cooker but she who mostly does the cooking doesn't want one. Since the last person I want to get on the wrong side of is the cook, we have gas.
 
We have paraffin (Optimus) but the new boat will have gas... We will have to see how we get on with that. Took a wee while to understand how to get the best from the paraffin system but now rate it very highly. Inclined to fit a Taylors to the new boat too but I will give the gas a chance.

I would say that paraffin is more common than spirit for cooking.
 
My boat had a very substandard gas set up when I bought her. It would have been difficult to install a safe gas system meeting all the recommendations. I have now had a double burner spirit stove for six years: no complaints but then I have low culinary aspirations.
 
Every boat we've owned has had an Origo but only because we put them in :)
Boat owners are consummate bodgers and I wouldn't trust our lives to some through bulkhead compression fitting installed by someone like me. Some owners are more fastidious than me but scarily some are less!
I like meths for its easy availability in any marina or hardware/DIY store, the fact that it doesn't explode, gather in the bilge, seep out or need me to climb out of my bed to switch it off are all bonuses.
 
I can't think why anybody would want to spend a month in a galley with anything but gas!

Having seen a primus paraffin stove explode I would never want to be within 100m of one again.
 
Camelia said:
I can't think why anybody would want to spend a month in a galley with anything but gas!

Having seen a primus paraffin stove explode I would never want to be within 100m of one again.
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It's just as well then that boats with gas never explode.
 
My Centaur doesn't have a gas locker and the retro fit ones that I have seen don't look neat to me.
Well not neat enough to justify cutting holes in a sound boat just to change to gas for dubious improvement in cooking arrangements.
We use an Origo 2 burner job but only miss a toaster. An oven would be nice to have but would mean butchering the inner moulding so it's not going to happen.

The trail sailer has a locker suitable for storing gas safely and we have a 2 burner and grill on that.

If you just have 2 burners there is virtually no difference between spirit and gas cooking wise IMHO. Storing the fuel is the bigest difference.
 
AngusMcDoon said:
The poll is coming out about 4 or 5 to 1 in favour of gas over spirit with hardly anything else used.
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Would be interesting to correlate to size of boat. Suspect that break point would be around 24/25' which is where boats are more likely to be used for longer periods and be big enough to fit a proper gas system. This may of course also correlate with the original proposition of inshore/offshore.
 
AngusMcDoon said:
Spirit seems more popular in the smallest boats, i.e. 22' sort of size like Dylan's. Cheap installation, not much maintenance, no insurance bother, and takes little space.
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Previous boat was a 30 footer with an American built spirit cooker; three burner-and-oven burning pressurised spirit.
It was great for me, burning clear meths and not smelly.
The main reason was that the boat was an old woody with anything heavier than air going into the bilges.
Present boat (US built) came with a big horizontal propane tank on the aft cabin roof. That was removed and replaced with a gas locker big enough for two calor cylinders, one butane and the other propane for when life on the loch gets a bit chilly.
The Force 10 doesn't mind what colour the tanks are.
 
I've been on dozens of boats over the years, and I can only think of one that didn't have a gas cooker (that one was an origo or similar). Most would have been 32' or above, while the origo boat was 23', so the idea that meths is mostly found in small boats certainly fits.

I would always choose gas. Spirit is too slow, and isn't much good for grill or oven (I know there's an origo oven, but I wouldn't like to try baking cakes in it). Paraffin is hotter than gas, but fiddly to get going (you can't send any old person down to put the kettle on). I rather like the romance of the AGA-style always-on diesel stoves for a cold-water liveaboard, but in practice I can see many problems (better a gas cooking stove and a Refleks heater with one ring on top). Electricity is obviously only feasible for mobos and marinaholics, which I am not. So gas it is - turn the tap and it just works. I only wish more marine cookers had built-in ignition like domestic ones.

Pete
 
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