Kovea Spider and upside down canisters - sputtering?

Recently I purchase a kovea spider to use canister fuel inverted for short and ultralight high mountain ascents

As low as 10,000 feet the inverted canister method seems to be working fine except that the stove would seem to sputter when set to full blast. Turning the can over in fact seems to supercharge the stove in way that makes it actually very difficult to bring the flame down to a simmer level - it's a very fine control between all or nothing.

In addition even if I reduced the fuel output slightly above 0 to limit the sputtering the flame would occasionally go out. Wind was not an issue. Is this normal with this stove or did I get a defective unit.

For reference I was using standard MSR canisters