We throw around the words rocket stoves a lot at Bear River Rocket Stoves, but what, exactly, is a rocket stove? How does a rocket stove work? Can you build your own rocket stove? And, what makes Bear River Rocket Stoves stand out as a source for emergency cooking and a sustainable survival solution?
Blast your emergency preparedness into orbit with a rocket stove.
What is a rocket stove? A rocket stove is a small, wood-burning stove with an interior elbow heating unit. Rocket stoves are very energy efficient and easy to use in situations where fossil fuel and electricity are not available. Because rocket stoves burn wood, the fuel is more readily available. A rocket stove is able to run from small amounts of wood, making it a very resourceful way to cook. Rocket stoves are an ideal survival stove because they easily burn twigs, leaves, and wood debris--all readily available after severe storms or earthquakes.
Rocket stoves are a popular survival stove because they can be used to cook almost anything that requires stovetop cooking. Typically small, rocket stoves can be used for camping, hiking, or backyard cooking. They are also ideal for cooking on-the-go.
Typically rocket stoves are a circular shape with an L or J-shaped heating chamber inside the stove. Fuel is burned in these stoves is by lighting a fire near the bottom of the elbow. An air draft is created from the chimney, causing efficient airflow within the stove. The stoves can heat up quickly and become very hot which makes them very convenient to cook with and serve people quickly. Rocket stoves propel air through the heating chamber, causing astronomically efficient fuel use.
How does a rocket stove work? In order for any fire to burn, it needs fuel, oxygen, and heat. These three factors are known as the combustion triangle. In order for fires to get very hot, they need plenty of oxygen. Blacksmiths and glass blowers employ bellows for their fires to deliver more oxygen and, therefore get the fire to the desired temperature to mold glass and shape steel. The airflow in rocket stoves works on the same principle.
Rocket stoves are designed with an insulated J-tube, or elbow where the fire of the rocket stove occurs. Sticks are placed in the end of the tube and air is pulled down into the chamber. When the oxygen-rich air meets the wood fuel and the heat created by the insulated tube, the ideal circumstances for combustion occur.
The chimney, where the “rocket” part of the rocket stove is, ensures proper ventilation to deliver plenty of oxygen to the fire. The ventilation in a rocket stove, allows the fuel to be heated with super-efficiency and allows the stoves to use very small amounts of wood fuel.
Once the fire is done burning you are left with ashes that can easily be cleaned out and the stove so you are ready for the next fire. In the most efficient stoves, there will be very few ashes. Overall the rocket stove uses the fuel more efficiently than other stoves.
Ready for lift off? Spend a few hours on YouTube to learn to make your own rocket stove.
How can I build my own rocket stove? There are a wealth of ideas on YouTube for making your own rocket stove. The basic idea is to create the J-tube or elbow for the interior of the stove. Pipes and even tin cans have been used for the interior heating chamber which is then insulated, usually with pearlite. An outer case is then needed to house the heating chamber and provide a surface for a pan to sit.
Building your own rocket stove can be a fun weekend project. Do-it-yourself rocket stoves can be made quickly and easily with readily available materials. Through the years, Dan Weatbrook, Sr., the founder and inventor of Bear River Rocket Stoves, has dabbled in dozens of small rocket stoves. While each stove met its purpose, to cook in an emergency situation, Dan wanted to improve upon each design. In each iteration, he adjusted the materials used to construct the stove, the way air circulated through the stove, the way a pan was able to sit on top of the the rocket stove, and even the possibility of making a rocket oven.
With each rocket stove Dan made, he began to realize the limitations of the small stoves.
While rocket stoves are an efficient way to cook from one pan, simple DIY rocket stoves have limitations. One drawback of the do-it-yourself rocket stoves don’t have an oven. In a situation where the power is out for an extended time or fuel supplies are depleted, cooking a one-dish, stove top meal for every meal becomes tiresome--both for the cook bent over the rocket stove and the people tired of eating only stovetop meals. In survival situations, a freshly baked loaf of bread, warm corn bread, or even a casserole would be a welcome change.
To Dan, the biggest drawback of DIY rocket stoves is the size. Granted, the do-it-yourself rocket stove designs allow for a quick and portable cooking source. But traditional rocket stoves only allowed for a single pan and lacked the ability to feed large groups.
So Dan designed Bear River Rocket Stoves with a different purpose in mind: he wanted to make a rocket stove big enough to cook--and bake--for a crowd. Dan took everything he’d learned over the years about rocket stoves and designed a super-efficient stove/oven combo powered by three separate rocket chambers. He included an oven. He used high gauge steel to resist heat warping. He put the stove on industrial casters to allow the stove to be easily repositioned. This rocket stove has an exclusive design and is the only one available on the market.
What started as a hobby has become a passion for Dan: to provide a way to feed your family or feed a group in emergency situations.
Bear River Rocket Stoves launch survival stoves to a new level
We think of Bear River Rocket Stoves as the Mother Ship of rocket stoves. They are large, sturdy, and worthy of a professional kitchen. While they are definitely not for the backpacking crowd, Bear River Rocket Stoves offer what small rocket stoves can’t: the ability to provide a hot, comforting meal to a group.
The size of Bear River Rocket Stoves mean you aren’t hunched over a tiny stove. The large griddle top and oven allows you to cook multiple dishes using minimal fuel. You are cooking with the convenience of a professional oven range. Dan has applied the principles of super-efficient rocket stoves to create a rocket stove/oven with efficient ventilation to make it easy to cook for a group of people with only a small amount of fuel. The efficient use of airflow in Bear River Rocket Stoves makes it possible to use a minimal amount of wood while not relying on fossil fuels. This efficiency is a key concept in the Bear River Rocket Stove design.
Whatever the situation you’re preparing for, Bear River Rocket Stoves are designed to help that situation be the best it can be under the circumstances and to duplicate the convenience of your own kitchen range and stove.
Dan’s vision is to provide a sustainable solution to cooking for your family or a crowd in a disaster and to provide the peace of mind knowing you have the means to use your food storage to feed your family or feed a crowd.
Some of the rocket stoves Dan made before developing the Bear River Rocket Stove.
Rice, Rain, and Hot Chocolate 4/24/16 by Dan Weatbrook, Sr.
The weather was 45 degrees,18 mile hour wind out of the south and raining hard. It was our monthly family get together and the grandchildren wanted to fire up a rocket stove. We took a vote and ended up deciding to try to make rice on the rocket stove. Because of the stiff wind, rain and cold it took us eight minutes to get fire in each rocket stove. It then took twenty minutes to get it up to temperature where it would boil water for the rice. We decided to put on a teapot full of water so we could warm up a cup of hot chocolate.
After thirty minutes we opened the lid and had perfectly done rice. The hot chocolate was delicious and welcomed. The grandchildren then roasted marshmallows in the rocket stoves and at the top of the chimneys. The rocket stove marshmallows came out burned on one end and raw on the other. The chimney marshmallows came out with just a tinge of brown and completely melted on the inside. They were the GREATEST.
We learned that when faced with a strong wind, build or find a shelter where you can get out of the wind. The rain as it went through a phase change and turned into steam it stole a tremendous amount of heat from the stove. If you can't get out of the wind, face the end of the stove with the two rocket stoves into the wind to help with draft. Covering the pot with the rice in it and the tea kettle with a dutch oven cover helped the water boil more quickly. The rice was not burned at all and was light and flaky. Even in these harsh conditions we were able to put out a great meal.
Tune in next week when we make bread in the rocket stove with no electricity, just a few buckets of sticks.. Dan, Sr. is the designer and owner of Bear River Rocket Stoves. He is passionate about teaching others to be prepared.
The Good Samaritan Is Alive and Well in Chubbuck, Idaho 4/7/2016 by Dan Weatbrook, Jr.
We had the opportunity to show our stoves in real life a few weekends ago at the Shelley Ready preparedness fair. On our way back from Shelly Ready, we had our own real-life emergency: our truck broke down.
We sat on the side of the road waiting for it to cool down, but realized overheating was not the problem. About an hour passed and a man driving with his family pulled his truck over by us to see if he could help. After trying everything he could think of to start the truck, he towed our truck with the trailer still attached off the freeway. We were only about 200 yards from the exit but he didn’t just pull it off the freeway but all the way to the parking lot of a hotel with a couple of restaurants nearby. This would be a convenient spot for us to wait for a tow truck.
When we discussed options for the night (the next day was Easter) he insisted on giving us a ride home. After taking his family home, he moved our broken truck to a spot out of the way and hooked up to our trailer and pulled it all the way to Garland Utah which was almost 100 miles one way. He spent more than 3 hours and 200 miles to get us where we needed to be and couldn’t have arrived at his own home before 10pm that night.
He didn’t have to help us, but he did and that selfless act impressed me. I now understand what it means to go the extra mile. May God bless the good Samaritan from Chubbuck, Idaho.
By day Dan is the Product Management Director for a software company. By night, he enjoys reading to his children (they're on the sixth Harry Potter book) and making pizza in the brick oven he built. On the weekends, he is a Rocket Stove evangelist.