Wick Burners: Martin's Tea Time (MTT) Candle Stove
Martin Boll, September 26, 2006
The stove I promised to make out of tea-candles is a “MTT”-stove (Martins Tea-Time).
I made it a year ago.
See the pictures and description below.
The “burner”: 6 tea-candles put in a circle plus 1 in the middle.
The “pot-stand”: 3 wine-corks, standing upright, in a (likely) equal-sided triangle (8”). If not exactly you can ply the stand together like in the picture.
The corks are held in position by clothes-hanger-wire (= sides of the triangle) (or a little bit stronger)
Both ends of the wire are cut with sharp edge to penetrate the cork easily and have a rectangle ply. The two short ends are 1” long and stick each in a wine-cork.
So the three wine-corks are the edges of the triangle.
You can bring to boil water in a kettle with 7 tea-candles, and keep the tea warm with one candle only.
That’s the 7 to 1 turning down ratio.
If the tea-candles in the circle are put on small aluminium-foil-strips, it is possible to pull them still burning out of the circle and cover them for extinguishing.
I think some of that “augmented rechaud” or “diminished stove” can make sense with RHC (retained heat cooking), e.g. to keep “the potatoes” in the low-temperature-cooking-range, which would be lost without additional small heat.
Let us think more about wick-burning. This simple technique is worth modernizing!
Regards
Martin
Note: Click on image to enlarge