Fun topic.

A little background; My favorite stove is alcohol. I use these two types (1 being the most used):
1. The ‘standard beverage can stove’ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beverage-can_stove
Mechanic Mike is well known on eBay. His listing describes exactly my results also http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=370303475806 They require a pot stand. But that has been nice so I can balance wide pots easily. It lights with one match w/o priming at 0F. That’s a true test of a no-fidget stove! And that’s not prewarming the stove or alcohol in your pocket first! However, prewarming does speed up blossoming (fully jetting). It takes ~20 seconds at 70F to blossom and ~60 seconds at 0F to blossom.
2. The White Box Stove. This holds more alcohol. It takes longer to blossom than above (45 seconds at 70F outside and 90 sec at 0F outside). It’s nice that it doesn’t require the extra piece (the pot stand) but it is trickier to balance a pot.

Now to your comments:
“1.3 ounces of Heet fuel”

I don’t know if you mean fluid ounce or mass ounce. Either way that’s a lot for me. I use around 0.8 mass ounces for 2 cups at 45F. And that’s with a little to spare.

“Rolling boil at around 6 mins. at 208 degrees or so in Colorado”

Yes, that’s typical for my stoves, after blossomed. A Caldera cone may take longer but it uses less fuel.

“Stove ran for somewhere around 19 mins before it petered out.”

Now this makes sense since you started with a lot of Heet.

“last few minutes were a little weak as far as the flame goes and not really useful for cooking.”

Hmm. My stoves go strong right unto the end and then bang (well, maybe more like a shuuuushhh), it’s out. I’m wondering if your fuel reservoir is a little too deep. This presents a problem in warmer weather when you only want to burn 0.3oz of alcy but it could never blossom because the stove is too deep.

“How well do alcohol stoves do as far as boiling water and running in the cold?”

IMHO, excellent. I’ve never had to fidget with these 2 stoves. Other alcy stoves--- I’ve had to fidget/fight with, especially titanium!

“As far as cooking goes, generally how many fuel ounces a day do you guys carry at altitude?”

In ‘mass’ ounces, I carry 0.8oz per 2C H20. So you’ll have to do the math. Fyi, 0.8 mass oz is about 1.0 fluid ounce for Heet.

“What do you prefer for fuel, Heet or something else?”

I like yellow-bottled Heet because it is very predictable no matter where you buy it. Denatured alcohol on the other hand behaves different from brand to brand and sometimes from lot to lot. Sometimes it burns too fast, burns yellow, burns too low so I’ve given up on it. Walmart also makes a very good generic brand of heet. In March, I snag them up on sale for 50¢/bottle (12 fl oz).

I’ve experimented with boil times of Heet and Denatured and they’re within 5 seconds of each other. Denatured claims more BTU but it doesn’t show in alcy stoves.

“I plan on building a super cat stove and one of the aluminum beer bottle stoves…”

Again, be sure to test your stove in the cold (I like 0F) so you won’t be caught off guard in a mountain blizzard.

Good luck with your stoves,
-Barry