Fun Summertime Projects! Make a Solar Stove Burner! Fast On-Demand Cooking. (vid comp) Parabolic DIY

[00:00:00]The smallest one is for the 6-8-in pans, and the other two can handle anything from 6-in all the way up to 10 or even 12-in pans.

[00:00:11]Just walk it out, drop the tripod down, grab the unit, pop it on, and snap the latch, and you're good to go.

[00:00:22]I love it because it's fast-action, on-demand style cooking. There's no waiting. You know, you get immediate results with this type of solar cooking.

[00:00:30]You can use it right when you're hungry, breakfast, lunch, or dinner. Just look outside, it's sunny, grab your collector and the tripod, go out there, and you're cooking.

[00:00:40]So, I made them in three sizes, 30, 36, and 40-in diameter. Smallest one handles the 6-8-in pans. The other two handle anything from about 6-10-in pans, possibly even 12 on the largest model.

[00:01:18]The reason these units cook so well and so even like that is because they have a 5-5 and 1/2-in focal point.

[00:01:24]Same diameter as the burner on your stove, so it works out really well.

[00:01:30]This is what the sky looked like during the cooking.

[00:01:36]Super easy build. They're all basically made the same. Just the under structure, the slick surface, and the mirror stickers.

[00:01:48]Super thin, as you can see, so really easy to store.

[00:01:53]And for ease of use, they all mount to a regular camera tripod, so nothing special there.

[00:02:00]It's basically just three things: cardboard, poster board, and something called mirror stickers.

[00:02:07]Stand is super easy to put together.

[00:02:09]I'll show you how to do that in the videos as well.

[00:02:14]The original unit is actually a replica I made of an older unit they don't sell anymore called the Solar Sizzler. It's this one. It was just an aluminized ABS plastic dish that you mounted on a tripod.

[00:02:27]I still have one, but you haven't been able to buy them in like 15 years basically anywhere of this kind, these thin, slim, disc style ones.

[00:02:37]Unfortunately, you can't buy anything like this anymore. The only ones they sell are these big monster 5-ft wide dishes that are close to 1,800 W, and that's just way too much for everyday cooking. That's like cooking on the largest stove burner on your kitchen stove on high high heat all the time.

[00:02:51]It's just no good for most things.

[00:02:53]My units all cook in the medium to medium high range. Originally, I was just going to make the 36-in model, but decided to make two more because the units worked so well. I wanted to try different sizes with different types of pans, different times of the year, stuff like that.

[00:03:14]For the small one, I just put a box in front of it.

[00:03:19]Just to show you something real quick.

[00:03:20]This mirror sticker stuff is extremely tough. You can't rip it, you can't pull it apart. It's like a very tough piece of plastic. That's actually what it is.

[00:03:29]It's acrylic plastic, similar to a thin Plexiglas.

[00:03:32]Even with a metal spike like these small screwdrivers, you can wrap this around, and you can pull or push it as hard as you can, and it won't go through. It won't even get close to going through. Barely even makes a dent.

[00:03:44]So, super super strong and durable stuff.

[00:03:49]So, if you want a fun summertime project that's easy to make and very useful, consider making one of these.