- Joined
- Dec 14, 2009
- Messages
- 112
Wanted to get out to my dad's back 40 today but I just didn't have time so I decided to start a little fire in the driveway instead. I put the Izula on horizontally in front of my belt so I could reach it inside my jacket and put the RC-5 on my right hip.
It's been poooouring since last night so everything is REALLY wet and the wind is blowing like stink.
Putting the lanyard on the 5 made chopping nicer on the hand and I soon got some standing dead oak chopped up. Found some smaller pine limbs and dead fur bows along with some birch bark.
The problem I ran into right away was not building a shelter first. Usually I get out of the rain and then get a fire going but I don't have that option where I live. I was keeping the supplies dry under the canoe until I needed them and used a scrap of plywood to keep everything out of the water.
I used the 5 to split the oak, shave the birch bark into fine little strands, feather some sticks and strip the wet off the outside of everything else. Then I used it to shave a pile of magnesium off my fire starter (not the one that comes with the Izula). Didn't seem to dull the blade to much but I didn't try to shave arm hair or anything.
Not being in any shelter my stuff was getting pretty wet so I commenced to dragging the flint across my nice new blade
Got huge showers of sparks and even got some embers going in the tinder but I was having a hard time hitting the magnesium. Then the flint fell out and I broke it trying to use it by it's self.
By now my pile was pretty soggy so I went inside and got a lighter
Poof! Fire!
After all that scraping on the flint I checked the edge of the 5. It wasn't sharp and it did take a couple of passes on the stone before I could strop it back to razor sharp but it did hold up way better than I expected. There was really no damage it just got dull. And I don't know what they coated it with but I wanna get some cause that stuff is AMAZING! The scales gave excellent grip in the rain and dried out faster than I thought they would and the sheath retained no water.
I didn't use the Izula for anything. I wanted to see how the 5 did the smaller shaving jobs. The only failure besides my planning and the flint was the MOLLE clip. It kept popping open and I think I'll replace it with tek-lok soon. I do like that I can change the orientation of the blade for different carry options and I hope that the tek-lok allows me to do the same.
So far I am very pleased with the 5 and hope to get to some shelter building later this week.
My camera isn't water proof so I was only able to get this one picture when the rain halted for a moment.
It's been poooouring since last night so everything is REALLY wet and the wind is blowing like stink.
Putting the lanyard on the 5 made chopping nicer on the hand and I soon got some standing dead oak chopped up. Found some smaller pine limbs and dead fur bows along with some birch bark.
The problem I ran into right away was not building a shelter first. Usually I get out of the rain and then get a fire going but I don't have that option where I live. I was keeping the supplies dry under the canoe until I needed them and used a scrap of plywood to keep everything out of the water.
I used the 5 to split the oak, shave the birch bark into fine little strands, feather some sticks and strip the wet off the outside of everything else. Then I used it to shave a pile of magnesium off my fire starter (not the one that comes with the Izula). Didn't seem to dull the blade to much but I didn't try to shave arm hair or anything.
Not being in any shelter my stuff was getting pretty wet so I commenced to dragging the flint across my nice new blade
Got huge showers of sparks and even got some embers going in the tinder but I was having a hard time hitting the magnesium. Then the flint fell out and I broke it trying to use it by it's self.By now my pile was pretty soggy so I went inside and got a lighter
Poof! Fire!After all that scraping on the flint I checked the edge of the 5. It wasn't sharp and it did take a couple of passes on the stone before I could strop it back to razor sharp but it did hold up way better than I expected. There was really no damage it just got dull. And I don't know what they coated it with but I wanna get some cause that stuff is AMAZING! The scales gave excellent grip in the rain and dried out faster than I thought they would and the sheath retained no water.
I didn't use the Izula for anything. I wanted to see how the 5 did the smaller shaving jobs. The only failure besides my planning and the flint was the MOLLE clip. It kept popping open and I think I'll replace it with tek-lok soon. I do like that I can change the orientation of the blade for different carry options and I hope that the tek-lok allows me to do the same.
So far I am very pleased with the 5 and hope to get to some shelter building later this week.
My camera isn't water proof so I was only able to get this one picture when the rain halted for a moment.
