An idea for functional emergency survival stuff.

hushnel

hushnel

Joined
Feb 3, 2009
Messages
727
I had some fatlighter I was going to send to friend until he told me not to and decided to split some up to stash in my various packs, boxes and tackle boxes. I made up a bunch of bundles from just two of the four sticks I was gong to send and I noticed how saturated this wood is with resin. I pulled out a Ferrier’s rasp and started making coarse sawdust like that stuff the sale as MayaDust and wow what a beautiful piece of wood.

It's almost like a translucent stone. I worked down about 4 pieces to cool looking little rectangular beveled pieces and drilled a hole in them. The small ones will be zipper pulls and the larger ones will be key fobs. I’m thinking of making up some lanyard beads and buttons, all of which in an emergency could be used to start a fire. Pretty sick mind I’ve got deal with.

I’ll snap some pictures tomorrow, I’ve got rehearsal tonight.
 
Not sure if the resin saturated wood is going to be very friendly in your pockets or arround your clothes in warm weather... Let's see if someone a bit more experienced can chime in and tell us about it.
Mikel
 
Perhaps you could coat it with some clear nail polish, should stop the resin from staining everything, and it won't adversely affect the flammability.
 
I seriously doubt it will be a problem. This particular piece of wood I’ve had around for about 5 years, it was old when I pulled it out of the firewood pile. It doesn’t even feel tacky, it is stable. It’s is not going to run or stain, this wood has been in my shed here in southern Florida or in a wood pile baked by the Florida sun for years. It’s similar in constancy to the rosin I use on my fiddle bow. I was even thinking of using it for a knife handle except it is kind a brittle.

This may be a piece of a tree that was hit by lightning or fire, actually it didn’t even clog up the file or sand paper all that much. It’s rather hard, like amber but it fires up nicely burns hot and long.

I have a couple pieces of Oak that are nearly as resinous as this piece of pine.

I think from these replies that there has been a failure in my explanation of what it is I'm working with. I’m a wood guy I select my woods for building musical instrument, I’ve been a cabinet maker and worked wood for more than 40 years. Other than freshly milled pine, that could bleed for a few months, I’ve never seen what you describe.
 
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:) no man, but I did log on to this site after you sent me the link. :)

I've actually been doing this kind of stuff since I was about 8 years old, started playing instruments when I was 7. These are the two things I've done my whole life both are a kind of passion.

You how ADD I am and how much stuff I build, once you got me thinking about the pine I had stuff just started happening. :)
 
hushnel said:
I had some fatlighter I was going to send to friend until he told me not to and decided to split some up to stash in my various packs, boxes and tackle boxes. I made up a bunch of bundles from just two of the four sticks I was gong to send and I noticed how saturated this wood is with resin. I pulled out a Ferrier’s rasp and started making coarse sawdust like that stuff the sale as MayaDust and wow what a beautiful piece of wood.

It's almost like a translucent stone. I worked down about 4 pieces to cool looking little rectangular beveled pieces and drilled a hole in them. The small ones will be zipper pulls and the larger ones will be key fobs. I’m thinking of making up some lanyard beads and buttons, all of which in an emergency could be used to start a fire. Pretty sick mind I’ve got deal with.

I’ll snap some pictures tomorrow, I’ve got rehearsal tonight.
Click to expand...

You could make several beads and use twine to make a tender necklace... the twin and the beads could be used for fire starting... then take that and hang a firesteel and striker off of it.
 
Yeah, good idea. I'm always thinking of using stuff for primary and backup purpose. Like the parachute cord wrapped knife handle, makes a lousy knife handle though. Saw a fire steel set on ebay that the guy uses a P-38 can opener as the striker, I thought that was a cool idea, if it works, some of the P-38s I've had would work some seem like crappy aftermarket stuff.
 
I've played with this idea using small wood blocks soaked in Tung Oil. That has worked well for me as portable 'fire fixuns'.
 
hushnel,

Take a look at this previous thread: Fatwood Beads.

Mike is away from the forum until next week but I'm sure he'll chime in here when he gets back. It would be nice to get a report on how these are holding up after some time.

-- FLIX
 
Mikel_24 said:
Not sure if the resin saturated wood is going to be very friendly in your pockets or arround your clothes in warm weather... Let's see if someone a bit more experienced can chime in and tell us about it.
Mikel
Click to expand...

I have lots of such experience. It's never been a problem for me.
 
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