Fire steel ulimited?

L

lonster8

Joined
Jul 8, 2009
Messages
135
Hi, i have a question.
I want a fire steel but i want to know if a fire ever get a sort of "empty", can you make sparks unlimited or if you use it a lot it won't be making sparks?? soory for my bad english.

Thanx Leon
 
You shave small pieces off of the firesteel to produce the sparks. It will eventually wear away. It takes a lot of scraping to make one useless. I believe I heard that the light my fire swedish firesteels are good for something like 7000 strikes. I could be mistaken, however.
 
It's metal so it wears down with time but it's my understanding that it takes thousands of uses to wear it down.

Nice thing about the RAT firesteel is that if needed, you can replace the firesteel.
 
I had a very small keychain firesteel when I was in scouts. I used it for years and never wore it out. They do eventually wear, but it takes so long it doesn't matter really.

The RAT firekit is excellent and available from almost any online knife store. Also checkout www.goinggear.com and www.firesteel.com
 
The goinggear firesteels are softer than light my fire, so you shave off more metal and they get used up faster. But they are still good for quite a long time.
(I bought 3 in June I think, and two are untouched, the third has seen quite a bit of abuse - trying lots of different tools to strike, striking just for the fun of it, experiments with tinders, and it is still good for quite some use and tests, I haven't used up 20% of it.)
 
What are you liking for tinders lucky? Other than the usual stuff, I'm loving vasoline soaked cotton. Been trying to source some powdered Mg, but with the shipping restraints on it, no luck. White phosphorus would be perfect, but I def can't get my hands on that anymore.
 
I took a new liking to saltpeter impregnated cotton - works like char cloth is supposed to work, without the hassle of charring (my first try at that didn't work). And then you need dry grass or leaves - anything you can form into a nest and blow it into a flame.
I also like the tissue trick (wrap that around a striker), though I'm not sure it would work with the GoingGear striker.
In natural tinders I like dandelion seeds - they are a flash starter, I use them with grass and wood shavings - mix well, have enough dandelion seed in it, don't crush while mixing, one strike ... add kindling ...

Then I have a charcoal lighter made from wood and wax, that you can light with a firesteel. They come packed in bars, and one bar is good for 6 or more fires in dry weather. I have one bar in my pack at all times.
 
I have bought firesteels from firesteel.com and they work great. They are cheap enough so you can buy a few ( or a lot:)) and not have to worry if one ever does wear out.
 
I use the Light My Fire Army Firesteel.

Will last up to 12,000 strikes.

The easiest way to start fires with a fire steel is by using dryer lent.

I have tried different tenders but it has been in wet conditions, which is VERY hard, even with a fire steel. Even hand sanatizer is not all that great when your tender is wet, the sanitizer does burn, but with wet tinder, that is all it does, LOL, nothing kicks off.

I have also used the mini firesteel, now with that, because it spits out fewer sparks, dryer lent is best, you really have to have good tender when using the small steels.


luckykitty really knows her stuff :)
 
I got a LMF scout this past Christmas and it was "finished" about a month ago. I have the LMF Army one and just picked up a no name one at a local army surplus store, It comes with a hacksaw type striker. It is slighty smaller in diameter than the army model but a little longer and throws sparks nicely for $9 !!!

Rat Pack #222
 
When I use the minis, I'll put one end on a rock, and press the other end with my thumb. Then I'll run a knife up and down it, which with a misch metal rod will make a nice mess of sparks all over.
 
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