Car Kettle - any advice?

[Stasher]

This has been prompted by buying a new (not new-just new to me) car and transferring my kit over to it

I have always had a minimalist approach to in-car survival. BUT I now think that if I am stuck in the car for several hours during the winter what I would really like is a hot drink.

I've had a look and the reviews for car kettles don't appear to be that great. Does anyone have an in car kettle and if so, would they recommend their brand? Indeed any advice would be appreciated

Thanks guys

[Yorkshire Andy]

I have one and its errrr very slow..

I've a cheap eBay stove and small butane and propane mix gas cartridge.. And a metal bcb crusader cup


Add to that tea bags (I drink tea black) and a few bottles of water.. I have a hot drink..

Stash a couple of meal pouches check Tesco for look what we found meal pouches ... Boil water in cup with pouch you then have hot food and a drink together chuck in a disposable fork or spoon or a spork and there's food and a hot drink to be had

[Jamesey1981]

I always just used to carry a small stove and a camping kettle, one of the little esbit stoves will do the job if you can get out of the car to use it, and doesn't require a gas cylinder or carrying a bottle of flammable liquid, and also won't drain your battery, which could cause an issue if you've broken down or run out of fuel, and if you stick a mess tin in they'll heat up a tin of soup as well, which would be far more substantial than a cup a soup.
Other alternative is self heating drinks if you can still get them, used to be able to get self heating pre sweetened espresso with guarana in it, not looked for them recently but you can probably get them online, I used to carry a couple of those on long drives to perk me up quickly if I needed it.

As for electric car kettles, must admit I've never used one, but I have a low wattage kettle on my boat so I don't pop shore power circuit breakers or overwhelm my inverter and it's SLOW, I would imagine a kettle that will run off a cigarette lighter socket would be even slower, as it can only supply a certain wattage.

[bunkai]

The best 12V car socket I found was rated at 16amp or 192 watts.
If you boil 300ml water (average mug coffee) at 192 watts it will take a minimum of 12.5 minutes to boil.
In reality it may take a bit longer due to inefficiencies and ambient temperature.
Each cup should take no more than 4 amp hours from your battery.

It's not a bad shout for a quick hot drink if you can find a 12V kettle that will boil 300ml of water efficiently but your average car battery 60AH will not be able to make too many drinks before it lacks the kick to get your car started! I would estimate maybe 5 drinks if your battery is good.

[Yorkshire Andy]

I flattened my car battery boiling one cup on the drive and mines a ecm 85ah ish heavy duty type battery

[poppypiesdad]

Car Kettle pretty pointless even the truck 24v ones (for in the truck btw) are painfully slow
Take a large flask 1.5 litre and refresh it before you move your location , ie fill it at home , refillnut at work before driving home , but don't just dump the water when you arrive at the locations , you never know when the power might go off

J

[sniper 55]

I had a mate who had one he bought in a car boot sale, it was probably about the size if a tin of beans-ish (so about 1 mug) it did work, heated the water up quite well, although it did take a good while, I'd guess about 15 mins or so, that wasn't to boiling, he just wanted a hot drink, it was hot though, couldn't have been far off boiling. We left the enging running so no problems running tha battery down.
Would I buy one.... No to be honest, as someone else said, a cheap stove and a mess tin, job done, and if it tunrs nasty you can take that with you when you leg it.
The only advantage I can see for tha car kettle is you may not be able to use a stove outside for some reason, maybe if your stuck on the motorway or a busy public place, nobody will see the car kettle simmering away quietly under the dash.

[munchh]

Car Kettle pretty pointless even the truck 24v ones (for in the truck btw) are painfully slow
Take a large flask 1.5 litre and refresh it before you move your location , ie fill it at home , refillnut at work before driving home , but don't just dump the water when you arrive at the locations , you never know when the power might go off

J

I'm with Poppypiesdad on this one, i work nights and as soon as the frost starts i have a stainless steel flask (ikea does the best one for very little money, i have 4) that i fill before i leave for work, before i leave to come home i will use the flask to defrost the windows on the van and refill it.

on top of that, i have a brew kit that has either a small gas or meths stove, i will be using a gas one this year as i have a new one to try, of all the stoves i have used gas is the most no nonsence way to boil water, you can do it in the passanger footwell. I have a 12v kettle, but it was used once and has been shelved ever since.

[Hoipoloi]

I had a 12v kettle years ago and it took about 20 minutes to boil. Only good if the engine is running, so as has been said, if you're stuck in a motorway jam for hours then this is the best option for making a hot drink (you can't fire up the Trangia on the hard shoulder).
I ended up using it to warm the baby's bottle up about 10 mins before finding somewhere to park up. The baby is 24 years old now so those kettles may have improved slightly since then.

[Mortblanc]

One of these will do the job for you. They plug into the lighter socket and will bring a cup to a boil in less than one minute. You should be able to find one at any large outlet on the major motorways (we call them "truck stops", don't know what you call them).

http://www.amazon.com/RoadPro-RPBH-012- ... er+element