It's real simple- make sure you have airflow in, and airflow out. The only way it would be really dangerous over short term and limited use would be to a VERY confused drug addict who stuck it in thier pipe. <img src="/images/graemlins/blush.gif" alt="" /> As I said in my first post to this thread, don't let it get into your food, either the fuel, the residue, or contained fumes, and you'll be fine.

MSDS at Zen Stoves for triox.

Basically, the concern is becuase one of the ingrediants in triox is metaformelahyde. It IS cancerous, and it can cause liver or kidney damage, but you'd have to eat a triox bar for it to have a statistically significant risk. (And you'd get really, really sick from some of the other stuff in there before the liver and kidney damage killed you.) You suck in more metaformeldahyde mowing your lawn. Your kids get more exposure from the exhaust filtering up through the floor of thier school bus. You'd really have to depend on it for years to cook every meal before you say an increase in exposure that you can blame on the trioxe if you use it properly.

Short term, it is a skin irritant. Handle it as little a possible, don't chew on it, and keep it out of your eyes. Don't expose it to strong oxidizers, like strong hydrogen peroxide or potassium permanginate solutions, or to strong acids, as it may spontanously combust.

Long term, it isn't made for long term use. Try not to suck in the fumes, but if you do, it is honestly in the car with bad exhaust catagory.

If you are worried about everything in your kit that could be toxic, you'll have no kit. You can drown in two inches of water. You can choke to death on a survival ration. You can smoother under a survival blanket. Just be smart about your gear. And make sure your kids know it isn't a toy, teach them how to either use it or don't touch it.

PS, by contrast, hexamine tabs not only contain paraformeldahyde and thus release formeldahyde fumes when burn, the same as triox, they also release ammonia. That it does so is part of why hexi is twice as hot as triox.

THERE IS NO WAY to make a long term, shelf stable, solid fuel that isn't based on organic beeswax and organic sawdust that is going to be free of these. Oh, and the organic beeswax probably will have some ammonia in it (bee pee), and if the organic sawdust is from an evergreen or ceder it will have some kind of formeldahyde-family compound in it (scares off the bugs). That's the long, short and blunt of it.

What is going on here...are both trioxane and the esbit tabs toxic?

If eaten or smoked, yes!

If used properly, for limited usage, NO!

If you have flames, toxins, even if it's just carbon monoxide, are being produced. If you want completely non-toxic, eat cold rations.

Oh, wait, most rations come in a plastic lined bag or box, and we all know the dangers there.

Or foil- tin and aluminum have both been investigated as long term toxins.

If it came in a paper package, was it unbleached and unprocessed? Oh, the horrors of clorine and sulfer compounds!

Oh, that leaves you with a wooden box, which could give you splinters, and many woods have tannic acid or paraformeldahyde in them, both of which can cuase liver and kidney damage. Or it might be something with it's own poisons. And there is always the risk of nut allergies being tied to protiens in the wood.

And heaven forbid it has meat in it- it might have been irradiated. Or had growth hormones.

And the vegitables might have been treated with pesticides or ANY kind of fertilizer.

And no apples or pears, becuase they have cyanide in the seeds.

And no potatoes, they are related to nightshade, which is full of lethal alkaloids. And you can't trust grains, what if there was argote in the fields- another dangerous, hallucinagenic alkaloid that can kill you.

And it has to be cut small, so no one can choke.

And it has to start small becuase knives are sharp.

And you can't be too sure about the water unless it's been distilled, and even then, how can you know there are no contaminants leaching out of the glass?

Oh my gods! There is air. Air has nitrogen in it. You can drown in nitrogen, and it can cause the bends.

And air has carbon dioxide and monoxide in it. You can't breath those, you'll sufficate.

Oh, will the nightmare never end- oxygen, it is corrosive! It kills living tissue. It has already wiped out every living thing on this planet once, we must outlaw it before it can be used to kill again!

Get the point? EVERYTHING in the universe is TOXIC if you have TO MUCH of it. Used according to thier intended purpose and with proper and due respect for thier inheriant dangers (aka, ouch-hot), triox, hexi, sterno, nu-wicks and campfires are safe. Anyone who wants to worry about the femtoscopic dangers probably would have voted "yes" on the Californian stupidity that requires labeling of any product that might have a carcengenic component in it.

Life is a risk. Deal with it. And if you feel like you've been picked on, good. <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> Sometimes being poked with the "humble stick" is the only way to make humans work. I'm not trying to be mean, I'm just pointing out that nothing is safe if used wrong. If I was being mean, I'd have used the "ugly stick". <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Follow the directions, use common sense, and wash your hands after handling the fuel and before handling the food. Wash the pot afterward.

By the way, welcome aboard, General. :P

I know what you mean...I actually want to use these things to start a campfire, not cook with.

Then don't worry about it. Just use the thing, keep it away from kids. :P

As for the non-toxic question you raised, I'm gonna throw a shocker at you- if you have ground water that comes through granite, you have uranium in the water! Yes, uranium, the radioactive no-no that powers half of the only hope we have of breaking the petrochem dependency and makes up the "special sauce" that makes a plain bomb an atomic bomb.

Here's the thing. Uranium is naturally occuring. It is in your body anyway, all the elements are until you get to the transuranics. But if it is in small enough doses, it isn't dangerous. Used as per reccommended guidelines with all due care and respect for it's innate properties and in suitably moderate ammounts, pretty much everything is non-toxic. As part of that due care and respect, you don't chew on the stuff, and not just becuase it will burn your tounge. :P

Looked at another way, would people spend billions of dollars on bottled water if there was a warning on it? You know, something like "Hazard: May cause death"? I can drown someone in four inches of Icelandic glacier water that cost me umpty dollars as easily as I can four inches of Jersey storm runoff that the EPA will give superfund money to take off my hands. <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Since when has endangering the health of the troops been a big concern of the military?? Agent Orange, depleated uranium rounds... the list is a long one. Anyway - use in a WELL VENTILATED space - like outside - no problem. Don't eat the Trioxane and don't rub it in the food - As others of said - we all deal with things everyday that are toxic if improperly used. (Gasoline, bleach, my stepmother's cooking...(at least I never have to deal with that poison again)). Give it a go. I would, however, attempt to work on conventional firestarting methods first as it's better not to have to rely on things like trioxane to start a fire. (Not that it won't do the job - it just might not be on hand when you need it.)

I didn't think you were blunt... actually, I thought you were quite generously polite <img src="/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />, but that's just me, and everybody knows what a short fuze I have <img src="/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />.

Troy

Under certain circumstances, when improperly used, yes... but you can read and write (you made the post), so you should be fine... provided you follow the directions, and the suggestions posted here so far. As has already been pointed out, any fuel is dangerous/toxic if used wrong or without a little bit of common sense.

Troy

I love the stuff and have used it for I guess the last 7-10 years. Yes it works great with wet wood, Just start with something real small and as Chris indicated work your way up to bigger wood. If the wood is dry, most times you only need half or a third of the full bar to get the fire going...then you just wrap the remainder up in the foil packaging it comes in. The packaging itself is waterproof until opened and then just depends on your reseal method. I pulled one out of my pack to find that it had been crumbled into powder...still worked to light a fire.

I wouldn't pay to much attention to the scare mongering..just wash your hands if you have to touch it. It's easy to get a fire going without touching it. Open one end and just slide it out...if you only need a 1/2, break it while still in the wrapper then dump out a half to use. It's really great stuff, heres the website where I get mine.

Sportsmans Guide

If it's raining cat's & dog's, your soaking wet & your lighters flooded,Trioxane, Esbit or Wet-Fire and your ferronium rod will get a fire going first time, every time. Just don't use it in a confined space. Otherwise you might be giving Angles lessions in fire making. So the short answer to your question is "yes".