Condensation Problem in a 22 Cruiser.

Ordutch1975":vsgej0v8 said:
colbysmith":vsgej0v8 said:
There are enough air leaks that I shouldn't need to keep any windows open. (Ie, sink drain and anchor rode hawser.) Colby
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I am not sure about that - I slept with two friends on the boat in the fall before the heater install with the door and windows closed on my venture - come morning time I could not light my jetboil indoors. when I opened the door and windows it lit without issue. IE too little oxygen and dangerous. ...
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Aaack! What thataway said! A JetBoil is a very serviceable backpacking/climbing stove, and lights easily up to at least 12,000 ft. Definitely low O2 if it will not light.
 
IMO, I doubt that a typical C-dory will seal up enough to reduce the available oxygen content significantly enough to prevent your stove from working just from people breathing (even 3).

The Jetboil fuel is listed as "butane/propane". It does not indicate the percentages of each. However, if it is mostly butane and it was cold I suggest that the stove did not light because the fuel was too cold to vaporize properly. After fiddling with it for a bit and or having it warm up some while you messed with the windows enough of the fuel vaporized to allow it to light. Butane will not vaporize below about 32 deg F.

I have a butane stove and on cold mornings it is usually necessary to warm the butane canister with body heat to get the stove to operate. As the fuel vaporizes it recools the canister and it may take a few tries to get the stove warm enough to maintain the canister temp.
 
slight opening to the cab for the control cables but that is in a tube and seems pretty well sealed on the rear where it exits the bulkhead.
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It sounds as if the new Venture is better sealed than the C Dorys. Some had the whole area cut out- down as far as the bottom of the tray under the gunnel. Some newer ones have about a 3" diameter hole with some gasket type of material around the periphery. That would give a surface area of about 7 sq inches and then the wires and cables might take up half of that--or 3 sq inches--still a fair amount of area for air circulation.

If you have a tube thru there, beside and always leave a "chase" wire or string, when you need to pull a new transducer, cable or wire thru.

The Diamond Sea Glaze doors may be better now--but my Tom Cat never closed fully tight on the gaskets.

There are different fuels ranging from pure propane, to pure isobutane which can be used in the Jet Boil Stoves. Certainly the temperature needs to be taken into effect for the fuel--and if it were pure Butane (not the generic Jet Boil) then vaporization could be the cause...But be safe anyway!..
 
An easy test is to wait for a nice sunny spring or fall day. Let the boat sit in the sun and get as warm as possible, then close it up. First thing the next morning see how hard it is to open the door. If the boat is sealed it should be noticeably more difficult than usual.
 
Jetboils are isobutane (BP 10F) not butane (BP 30F). However you can often have problems vaporizing enough fuel, since as it goes from liquid to gas to move into the burner, heat is absorbed from the ambient fuel, which can drop its temperature well below 10F. You'll see condensation of water vapor on the surface, or even ice. I believe what happened was this. Also if the O2 levels dropped enough to not light the jetboil, which I use on my boat, you would have died way before from CO2 toxicity. It is impossible to die from O2 depletion without some way to remove the CO2, which is highly toxic. A trick with the jetboil, either on CDory or mountaineering, is to heat a little water, and then sit the isobutane container into that warm or hot water. This will vaporize the isobutane inside the fuel canister.
 
You don't even have to heat the water (provided it is above the vaporization temp of the fuel). The thermal mass of even cold water will keep the canister temp from dropping further.
 
Two issues here: I find in most of the 22's there is a fairly good size opening under the cockpit combing into the cabin's aft bulkhead (both sides). This is probably bigger than the sink drain and perhaps the anchor locker; depending on the size of the deck pipe /or windlass line hole--both of these are probably going to be fairly high humidity areas.

I keep a SS scrub pad in this opening under the combings to keep critters out. There is always going to be some significant leakage around the doors.
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Except I've ran some extra wires and hoses that pretty much fills those spaces in the aft bulkhead, and then filled them with expanding foam!... (Keeps the pests out, primarily mice in the winter!) :mrgreen: Colby
 
Thank you for this ssobol. It'll save me fuel and time. I just learned something from someone probably using straight butane, and didn't think it through. I guess I've had most of my problems during winter mountaineering. I still use the Jetboil or an MSR Reactor, which is like a Jetboil, even in the coldest conditions, since both are so compact and handy and work well in wind. I used to use propane,which has no problems at all (BP = -43F), but the canisters are very heavy for the fuel contained. Canister stoves are still handier and work better than gasoline stoves for short trips. Most of my problems have been below -20F or so, and I'd keep the stove canister in the sleeping bag to keep it warm and so I could get that little bit of water heated. I was skeptical of the post and just tried putting the isobutane canister in the freezer for an hour. After taking it out, it didn't work well initially, but putting it in plain, cool water seemed to warm it up way past the 10F required quickly. I guess its like hypothermia in water vs air. You learn something new every day from this list, often useful.
 
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