Coleman Dual Fuel Camping Stove – Review

I use camping stoves for the last 25 years or so.

I had a lot of them, most of them were Butan gas stoves, 3 of them are gasoline ones.

Usually, I use the camping stoves to boil water for Coffee / Tea and to cook our camping meals. I love to make French Fries, Pizza and other food which demands a lot of heat for a long time, therefore, the main issue I had with the Butan stoves was the simple fact that they require Butan cans which are not always available outhere, in the middle of nowhere… (besides their relativly high price).

About 15 years ago I saw a friend using the Coleman Dual Fuel Dual stove during one of our off roading camps, It was a love from a first sight, few days later I ordered one from eBay and I’m using it since then…

So let’s talk alittle about pros and cons that stove:

Pro’s:

• Gasoline is everywhere… while we are on a camp, we all have gasoline and we stop by the gas staition at least once a day (or two), so no risk of being stuck out of fuel.
• Heat! these stoves are hoter than most of the regular Butan ones.
• Dual Stove means… 2 burners! if you have kids you will love that setup. You can cook the Pasta on one burner while boiling the hotdogs for your kids on the second one.
• Weather ? it doesn’t matter. the dual fuel stove will work in any weather (unlike the Butan ones that will fail to work in wind conditions.

Although it has a lot of pro’s, it is not perfect, here is the “con’s” list as I see it after more than a decade of use:

• It smells… well, not always, but you have to take some gasoline with you and if it spills in your car, well, it smells…
• It takes more time to light the fire. While using a Butan stove is as simple as using your home stove, lighting the dual fuels stove requires some pumping and using a “Choke” level. You will get use to it, it takes about half a minute, but it is there…
• Relaiblility: Basically, it will work forever, but, if you won’t use it for a long time, there is an O ring that might get dry and prevent you from lighting it up. Fix is cheap and easy, all you have to do it buy the repair kit.
• Price: It is more expensive than most of the Butan stoves.

Buttom line, the Coleman Dual fuel 424 (Dual Stove) is definitely one of the best items I bought for my camping and off roading trips. Soon I will post a review on the Coleman Oven with I used with the stove till I built my own camping Pizza oven.