Just learned those MSR camp stoves lose efficiency above 9,000 feet

Was reading some specs on the MSR WhisperLite last night. Turns out the fuel mix actually burns different at altitude. Nobody at the store told me that when I bought mine. Been up at 8,500 ft in Colorado and it was sputtering. Now I know why. Anyone else run into this with their stoves?

2 comments

2 Comments

ross.william27d ago

Huh, that's interesting, but is it really that big of a deal? I've used my WhisperLite up higher than that without much trouble. Maybe you just had a bad batch of fuel or something.

ryan_stone27d ago

Yeah Ross, I hear you on the bad fuel thing but honestly I think it's a real deal at elevation. I was up around 11,000 feet in Colorado last fall with my WhisperLite and it was the same story. It would barely hold a simmer and I had to leave it on full blast just to keep water hot. My buddy had the same stove and we swapped fuel bottles from different batches and it didn't help at all. The real kicker was when we tried my friend's MSR Reactor and it worked fine up there, no sputtering or anything. So I'm with the original poster on this one, at least for me the WhisperLite just doesn't love the thin air.