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Portable Generators
"Roger Long" wrote in message
... wrote It was a real eye opener for me the first time I tried it. I was just looking for a good method to use on board. I now use it at home as well. Even supermarket coffee tastes dramatically better from the french press. I used one for a season on board and loved it. What I didn't love was cleaning it out which seemed almost impossible to do without having some grounds excape down the sink drain. While the grounds did a good job of odor absorbtion in the sump, the pump didn't like them much. At Peggie's suggestion, I went to the Malita One Cup filter cones. Not quite as good but close enough that not having a major cleaning chore while I'm making my typical early departure is a good trade off. The grounds do a good job of odor absorbtion on the trash which is often kept aboard as well. Almost any cup of hot coffee tastes great standing on the dew covered deck in the crisp air of a Maine morning with the promise of a full day of cruising ahead. -- Roger Long You can also use coffee for absorbing oders by putting the grounds in baggies. You need to make sure they don't dump, but that's easy. I put them in the engine compartment (down low away from a lot of heat) and in the forward compartment underneath. I change them regularly. -- "j" ganz @@ www.sailnow.com |
Portable Generators
On Sun, 27 Apr 2008 03:14:39 +0000, Larry wrote:
My favorite coffeemaker, ashore or afloat. Uses 600 watts off the inverter for about 2 minutes per cup. Uses NO FILTER PAPER, but has a gold plated ultrafine metal filter that's permanent and washes very easy using little water. Just dump it over the side for the crabs and shrimp...only spent grounds. Everyone gets a fresh cup of coffee, no matter when their watch starts with NO WASTE. Very small footprint, too, on limited counter space. about $12 on several websites Google finds....even the nice thermal cup comes with it, but any cup will fit under it. Zero Propane, very little house battery AH load, no genset necessary. If you want to make 5 cups, use 2 tablespoons drip coffee for the first cup and simply add one teaspoon for each additional cup until the little filter is half full of grounds, then dump it and start over. It uses NO POWER to store heated coffee as it's unnecessary making every cup fresh..... AND NO GLASS TO BREAK FROM GODDAMNED FRENCH PRESSES! Hi Larry, My Bodum brand "french press" is made of unbreakable polycarbonate or somesuch. I also use it to brew herbal teas such as a mixture of thyme and marjoram for relaxing. Funny, nobody has mentioned the other common types of coffee maker which I have aboard the boat. 1. stove top espresso. The ground coffee sits in a metal insert which fits in the top of the bottom half which is filled with water. Screwed tightly on top of these is the "jug" for the brewed coffee. The superheated water is forced - all at once - up through the funnel shaped meatl insert - through the coffee grounds and up into the jug at the top of the contraption. Excellent though not as good as 15 bar plus espresso machines. 2. stove top Greek/Turkish coffee. Finely ground (powder fine) coffee is spooned into water in a small metal jug shaped pot with a long handle. Sugar may be added at this stage. The coffee is heated and then removed from the heat so that the froth rises to the top of the pot three times. It is left briefly so that most of the suspended grounds fall to the bottom and then poured into small cups. Different to italian espressp coffee but is the original coffee making method that is still used in the Middle East. I prefer it straight with no sugar as I do other coffee but it often is drunk straight at funerals and with honey or sugar at such as weddings. I have read references to espresso machines in this thread but they are only worth having if the pressure is a minimum of 15 bar. The cheaper and lesser wattage 9 bar ones do not produce the crema - froth - and hence the taste is not as good. I have a 15 bar one at home with the steamer attachment for capuccino which gets a hammering by the owner. In all this, good old instant coffee is a lot more handy and easier to make when you need to rush below to grab a quick cup of coffee. The body doesn't care. It just wants the caffiene. cheers Peter |
Portable Generators
On Sat, 26 Apr 2008 18:13:57 GMT, "Dennis Pogson"
wrote: Agreed. In forty-odd years of racing and cruising I have never seen coffee made in an electric percolator. O.K., for convenience we use instant coffee, but there must be lots of ways to make real coffee without a percolator. Those Italian aluminum percs you sit on the stove top would surely make a good cuppa? Dennis. Hi Dennis, I would advise against the aluminium ones as they seem to grow 'nodules" inside the bottom water reservoir after a time. Their are many stainless steel ones on the market that will last longer and not eventually develop a 'taste' as the aluminium ones seem to do after a while.. Whatever type you get, they are definitely better than dripolater ones and be sure to buy at least one spare rubber seal when you purchase the unit. cheers Peter |
Portable Generators
Richard Casady wrote:
On Sun, 27 Apr 2008 10:04:01 -0400, "Eisboch" wrote: You could always get a small propane camp stove; the risks associated are probably less than carrying gasoline. There are some I would like to point out thhat propane is considerably heavier than air, about the same density as carbon dioxide. Given a chance, it will settle into the bilge. The explosion possible with a pound of the stuff is equal to several sticks of dynamite, and can easily demolish a boat. It does also mix with air to the point that the mixture is too fuel poor to burn. It will do that, given a chance. This is why you see boats with a 20 lb bottle mounted over the side, outside and attached to, the stern railing. Gasoline main engines are probably more dangerous, slightly. I have been boating on an Iowa lake for fifty years. Never heard of a boat fire. Nearly all the boats are open runabouts, or in the case of the 5hp fishing boats, crawlabouts, and carrying a fire extinguisher is required by law. This may be true, but the actual incidence of accidents and fatalities is quite low. The total fire/explosion fatality count for the last 5 years is 16 for fuel, 4 for non-fuel in the USCG recreational boating stat. This is out of about 3600 fatalities from other causes. (Peeing over the side is probably far more dangerous than using propane.) There have been a number of non-fatal incidents, but most fuel fires occur during or shortly after re-fueling, when the crew is on deck. I've never witnessed a fuel fire but I've seen the aftermath a few times. When I was walking down the dock to inspect my new boat for the first time, the salesman said, "Don't be alarmed, there was a little incident but your boat is OK." It seemed the 30 ft powerboat diagonally across had taken on fuel, powered back to the slip, and exploded when the shore power was plugged in. There were no injuries, but boat was totaled, and the boat next to mine (owned by my builder) was scorched. Actually I did witness one impressive explosion. I was about 500 yards away from this one: http://infinitecoolness.com/gallerie...lownaway24.jpg |
Portable Generators
Herodotus wrote in
: In all this, good old instant coffee is a lot more handy and easier to make when you need to rush below to grab a quick cup of coffee. The body doesn't care. It just wants the caffiene. Here in the South, we'll do ANYTHING to keep from lighting a terrible cabin heater using propane, especially for heating water for coffee. The amount of waste heat making the already hot cabin even more unbearable from a running propane stove. Percolators, here, are used to make pots of BLOODY MARY, not coffee...(c; The little single cup coffeemakers produce virtually no waste heat to add to the unbearable cabin heating because they heat so fast and have such a very low thermal mass to cool once the cup has been made. The whole stove top is hot heating a quart of water....for a long time after the pot is gone! |
Portable Generators
The easiest and cheapest solution by far,.. GIVE THE **** UP!! Reject
your Dark Master at last and be free, free, freeeeeee!! Look how you're being controlled, unconscious sufferer; buying all this crap- $1000 generator? Kidding, right? A foo-foo french press? As if anyone wants anything French on their goddam boat. Filters, grinders, cups with stupid **** on them rattling around, a $2500 fridge to keep the half and half cold, a hermetic storage bin for Muffy's organic sugar, magic beans from far away lands- sheesh, you must have brain damage. Give it up now and at the end of your life you'll be refunded 6 free years of coffee break time. Time you can use to RELAX. Oh, forgot, you can't relax- your blood pressures over the top from all that caffeine. You're too ****ing spun from wondering where your next fix is coming from you snuffling addict. Think of all you'd save if you sold that boat and just sat in a Starbux shop with the cold sweats, starring numbly at passers by,.. It's high time you woke up, my friend,.. Peace is within!!! On Sun, 27 Apr 2008 10:06:41 -0700, Alan Gomes wrote: jeff wrote: Eisboch wrote: ... I've searched around looking for information on the safety issues of carrying a small, portable, gasoline generator on board for making morning coffee or whatever. I have a little Honda EU-2000 Inverter type generator that is small, light, quiet and completely self-contained. For my needs, I could fuel it on the dock, and it would have enough gas to serve the minimal morning coffee making needs for a week or more. No need to carry any more gas containers. ... Most everything has been said, but I can't resist putting in my two bits. First, There is really no problem with the Honda as long as its stashed in a place where any fuel leak will go overboard, instead of the bilge. I carry one in a cockpit locker that drains out the stern, and the spare gas stays in the dinghy hanging on davits. When its run, usually as a backup charging system, the exhaust is pointed out the stern. However, I must say that I find its too noisy to use in a crowded anchorage, especially if there is a boat directly behind. And running it first thing in the morning just to make coffee is decidedly anti-social. As for making coffee, a home style electric brewer is not needed, you can much better coffee with manual methods. Many prefer a French Press, but my favorite is a simple manual drip through a paper filter into a Thermos. I have a slight preference for a "gold filter" at home, but paper filters are much easier to clean on a boat. There are several other methods, but they are all just variations on the same theme: mix near boiling water with good coffee, that's all it takes. This of course leaves the question of how to produce boiling water - I'm assuming the you don't have a non-electric stove on board. (But then, how do you stay out more than a day? Do you intend to run a portable genset for every meal???) You could always get a small propane camp stove; the risks associated are probably less than carrying gasoline. There are some BBQ's (like the new Magma) that can easily heat a pot of water. Also, a microwave can boil a quart of water reasonably quick. Probably the best electric heater is a Bodum Ibis (or Mini Ibis), which can boil 1.7 liters in 4 minutes. Its total load for a Thermos of coffee would be about 10 Amp-hours, though of course a fair sized inverter is needed. Far most civilized than firing up a generator! Assuming that one does not already have a full sized, permanent gas or alcohol stove at the ready, I prefer those single burner butane "chafing" stoves used widely in wok cooking. In fact, I use mine almost exclusive for just heating up water or pan frying, saving my CNG stove for larger jobs (i.e., needing more than one burner) or for when I need an oven. Here's a nice picture of the one I have: http://tinyurl.com/6422hh. Lots of vendors sell even cheaper ones on e-bay. I get the canisters (that burn for an hour and a half or so) at a local Korean grocery store for under $1.00 each. (West Marine sells them for over $5.00 each!) Assuming you can local find a source for the canisters at a reasonable price this is a great option. --Alan Gomes |
Portable Generators
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Portable Generators
On 2008-04-27 13:38:11 -0400, Herodotus said:
In all this, good old instant coffee is a lot more handy and easier to make when you need to rush below to grab a quick cup of coffee. The body doesn't care. It just wants the caffiene. Oh gawd, I was having a good time until this.... that's not even decent brown water. -- Jere Lull Xan-à-Deux -- Tanzer 28 #4 out of Tolchester, MD Xan's pages: http://web.mac.com/jerelull/iWeb/Xan/ Our BVI trips & tips: http://homepage.mac.com/jerelull/BVI/ |
Portable Generators
On 2008-04-27 10:04:01 -0400, "Eisboch" said:
The boat in question has a propane system and stove, so there are other ways to quietly heat water. In that case, use them. No need to carry extra "stuff" for such a trivial chore. -- Jere Lull Xan-à-Deux -- Tanzer 28 #4 out of Tolchester, MD Xan's pages: http://web.mac.com/jerelull/iWeb/Xan/ Our BVI trips & tips: http://homepage.mac.com/jerelull/BVI/ |
Portable Generators
On Wed, 30 Apr 2008 03:17:48 GMT, Jere Lull wrote:
On 2008-04-27 13:38:11 -0400, Herodotus said: In all this, good old instant coffee is a lot more handy and easier to make when you need to rush below to grab a quick cup of coffee. The body doesn't care. It just wants the caffiene. Oh gawd, I was having a good time until this.... that's not even decent brown water. OK. Agreed that instant is second rate behind brewed beans but above the standard stewed coffee served from thermos devices in hotels in the USA but have you ever had to hand steer for a while whilst sailing solo with little time to grab a cup of coffee. Today I bought a new single cup Bodum brand polycarbonate plunger device from a store in Sydney. It is a single cup with a screw on lid. Your put the ground coffee in, screw down the lid upon it's rubber seal and after a decent interval, push down the plunger until it clicks in place. You can either pour it into a cup or sip it out of the dedicated hole in the lid which has its own little flap. Fantastic invention. Can now keep a small container of ground coffee in a deck locker and use the water from the thermos without needing to go below. Bodum also make a larger model that looks as if it would make about 4 cups. cheers Peter |
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