Ultralight Gas Bottle Stabiliser

This is my first instructable so please be nice!

There are many lightweight backpacking stoves available on the market where the burner unit is mounted on top of the gas bottle. While they are lightweight and powerful they all suffer with a common problem, instability.

This instablity is due to a top heavy design with a high centre of gravity. It could be knocked over by a stray foot for blown over by the wind in particually extreme weather. I aim to fix this design flaw.

This is even more of an issue when the stove has up to 1kg (1 litre) of water balanced on top in a pan for boiling.

This can easliy be solved with a quick, cheap and lighweight solution.

There are commercially available options such as the MSR Universial canister stand (shown). While making a gas bottle more stable it does come with the heafty price tag of £13.00 RRP. It is also heavier than my creation weighting in at 34.4 grams while mine is less than 1 gram!!!

A gas bottle of the required size
3 150mm cable ties
3 100mm cable ties
A pair of scissors

The cable ties are better in a bright colour so you can spot them easily.

Take all 3 150mm cable ties and attach them together to make a triangle.

Take your gas bottle and fit them over the top.

Tighten them until you get a firm fit but loose enough to slide them up and down the gas bottle. They will not slip off the bottem due to the rim at the base of the bottle.

Take the remaining 3 100mm cable ties and wrap them around and tie them on too the triangle. The smaller the better but large enough to effectivly hold the bottle down.

Take your scissors and cut off the end of each cable tie an it is ready to use!

It can be used by sliding the ties down over the top of the gas bottle. This rim at the bottom will stop it from falling off the bottom.

There are now many ways of attaching the gas bottle to the ground through the loops. The method I use it tent pegs as I do not need to carry any extra weight with me then as I am already carrying them and my tent will still stand minus 3 tent pegs.

You could also make you own stakes if you are not carrying tent pegs from small twigs that you find and dig them in to the ground.

You could also loop some 550 paracord around the ties to expand them and rest some rocks on the paracord to stop it moving.

Or anything else you can think of!!!

I can be carried around the gas bottle during transport or as I do folded up and tied with an elastic band and carried in my pot.

My design                                                                                                    


Weight         >1 gram
Price            6p
Packed size  60x15x15mm

 MSR universial canister stand
Weight 34.4 grams
Price £13.00 RRP
Packed Size 137x25x20mm

My design is also much more stable as the MSR stand as the MSR simply expands the surface area of the bottom and does now attach the stove to the ground.

Thank you for taking time to look at my instructable, I am entering for the great outdoors contest so please vote for me!!!