BIC!
I carried a Zippo for over 30 years just out of stubborn refusal to change to a better tool. But eventually I got tired of it being out of gas at the most inopportune moments. Or the Flint needing to be changed on the spot. Eventually, I ditched the Zippo and took up the Bic and never looked back.
The incident that changed me was trivial in the larger scheme of things, but it showed the long term reliability of the Bic. I had gone out to the shooting range and was the only one there. It was a private gun club out in the boonies. I took a break from shooting to step back and admire the beautiful summer day and enjoy a pipe. I packed some good Dunhill tobacco in my pipe, took out my trusty Zippo, and zip! Nothing. Nada. Dry!
This was an emergency. I really wanted t smoke my pipe. Dry Zippo, no matchers, but I remembered the emergency kit behind the seat of my pickup. In it was an old Bic that I had stashed there at least 5 years before. It was still in the plastic wrapper it had come in. Tore it open, not really expecting to have it work after all those years sitting in my truck in all extreme of temps from hot summer to freezing winters.
It lit the very first flick! Unreal!
I went on to use that same Bic for the next couple of months with no problems. The Zippo got ditched and never carried again. I have Bic's stashed in the truck, better halfs car trunk kit, day pack. It's been at least 15 years now that I've been using Bic's, and they always work, hold fuel for a pipe smoker for 4 to 5 months, and if you get the white or other light color ones, you can hold it up to a light and check how much fuel is left in it. I wouldn't go back to a Zippo if they were the last lighter company in the world. I'd carry matches before I'd carry a Zippo again. At least with matches I can see how many I have left, and they store for long periods very well.
Another Bic tale; not quite 20 years ago, our oldest boy was sent to San Jose, Costa Rica for 6 months on business for his company. The better half and I made arrangements to go visit. Unnown to us, John, knowing that his mom and pop were avid nature watchers, booked us on a trip in the rain forest. Hiking by day, with campsites by night. It was a guided group tour in the jungle, and it was an unbelievable time. Being a knife guy, of course I took note of what our guides were packing. They all had 12 inch machetes on their belts for most all their cutting jobs, including making dinner at our camp site that night. But I also noticed that they all had a little black nylon pouch on their belts that contained a SAK and a Bic lighter. They used the SAK for small cutting jobs, (SAK's seemed to be a universal pocket knife in Costa Rica). I asked one of the guides that spoke good English, why a Bic lighter. His instant answer was because they always work.
If a Bic lighter and a SAK is good enough for a guide in the middle of the Costa Rica jungle, that's good enough for me.
