Fire - when it counts

Well, it's up to a whole 11 degrees outside, but I got a fire going in less than 5 minutes with Petroleum Jelly cotton balls and a BSA Hotspark, and most of that was gathering tinder and kindling.

Only took one cotton ball.

I use a Camillus Electricians knife that has carbon steel blades. The wire scrapper on the locking screwdriver is a great sparker! :D

DSCN4575.jpg


DSCN4577.jpg
 
Mag bars are a major PITA. I have tried them and I think it would be difficult and time consuming if you were injured or wet and freezing and had cold shaking hands. Plus, they are VERY hard to scrape. You almost have to use the edge of your knife. Which in life or death is fine. Go for it.

But it's not necessary. A ferro rod can produce shavings by scraping it slowly with the reasonbly square spine of a knife. I think the shavings from a ferro rod are more "explosive" and flare up better than magnesium.

For folks that have never tried it: take a ferro rod and give it a pretty quick scrape but use a TON of pressure. You will peel off a huge molten chunk of material that will pop and flare up when air is blown on it. You can do all this without using the edge of your knife.

Carrying the shavings ahead of time is a good idea. I did it with magnesium for a while. Now I have a little bottle of shavings from a ferro rod in a little pill bottle. A little bit of that powder in wet tinder will usually get it going.
 
countryboycansurvive said:
Mag bars are a major PITA. I have tried them and I think it would be difficult and time consuming if you were injured or wet and freezing and had cold shaking hands. Plus, they are VERY hard to scrape. You almost have to use the edge of your knife. Which in life or death is fine. Go for it.
Click to expand...

Yes, it's hard to get shavings even in pristine weather. I've used my leatherman file or saw to get shavings off a bar before, lot easier than using a plain edge but still not something i want to be doing. But yeah, i can only imagine that extreme cold would compound that difficulty. I'm wary of carrying magnessium shavings though, I've only carried it in whole bar form. I've never tried getting large shavings off my firesteel before, I will have to try that next time to compare the two.
 
Yes, there was a recent thread actually in which the topic came up, let me see if I can find it. I don't have personal experience, but I follow the "better safe than sorry" idea.

http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=612579
mentioned on the first page by Magnussen. Basically magnesium shavings are readily oxidized due to the increased exposed surface area, making autoignition more favorable when the conditions are right. I don't know if shavings one would get from a magbar are small enough to permit the reaction, but your chances increase as the particles get smaller.
http://www.jtbaker.com/msds/englishhtml/m0088.htm
Correct me if I'm wrong, someone...it's been a while since chemistry.

I believe that's one of the reasons, if not the main reason, why labs store magnesium in salt forms, like magnesium chloride or magnesium sulfate. Sorry for going slightly off-topic, I look forward to your tests and results Mapper :thumbup:
 
Last edited:
Ah I was wandering if someone would mention a road flare. Seems a good emergency ignition source but I do have a question. How long do they burn for?

Also could you not carry a small candle/tea light? That way the first thing you light is your candle (using a lighter or whatever) and it becomes your 'source' so that when you are lighting your fire if it goes out you come back to the 'source' light your tinder and go again. I tried this technique using a birthday candle and a tea light. I wrapped both in tin foil so that when I lit them outside I could use the foil as a shield from the wind and rain. You might only get a couple of uses out the foil before needing to replace it but we're talking emergency setting here not everyday use. For wet weather I also like to carry a small strip of innertube maybe 1''x6''. It burns very well in all weather and is waterproof so no fear if it's raining. Ranger bands can also be used in a pinch.

I'm out at the weekend and will try and get some pics of my tin foil candles in action.
 
Once you have a flame, duct tape also burns very well. Common in most kits.
 
i have these things called Strike A Fire, made by diamond. essentially, they are giant matches. you just strike them on the box and they will burn for about ten minutes. the flame is pretty bug, so it would be really easy to get a fire going. the only problem is, they are a little bulky.
 
As others have pointed out, a file from a Leatherman Tool is really the best way to get magnesium off of those bars. That and a little duct tape and VOILA! FIRE! You don't use the magnesium sometimes? It's a good handle and the other part of it is still ferrocerium.
 
I've had better luck with 0000 steel wool than mag, but I don't know if the sparks from a bic or zippo would be enough. last time I did it I used torch sparker. I'm out or I'd test it.

I've had very good luck with WetFire tinder. it is expensive, but I have a tablet that has been opened for more than a year, and still burns just as good. grabs a spark very well, I've used just a little at a time, but if my life depended on it, the whole thing would burn. only problem is that you have to knife the foil open if your hands are cold.
 
when i am out in the bitter cold, i carry basic fire starting equipment, but the highway flare is the emergency firestarter for the do or die situations, light it and pile wood on it and you have a fire, i burned a hole in a steel can with one of these. you can buy them at walmart or any auto parts store. so they meet my criteria, easy to obtain just about fool proof, and will work under the worst conditions. burn for about 15 min. so you have time to pile een damp wood and get it dry and ignited befor the flare dies.

alex
 
“There is no option but a fire, and I have to do it one handed, and maybe wet. Whats the best way? As indicated, I've got a Bic lighter and vaseline soaked cotton balls. Is this good enough, or can I do better?”

I don't see why that shouldn't be enough unless you get into extreme hypothetical scenarios. Just for fun though you may want to play about with some potassium permanganate [KMnO4] and glycerine to develop your own hands free thing.

I've used KmnO4 like that to bemuse newbies a whole bunch of times. At the most simple I stick a teaspoon or two of that in a bit of A4, drop on a single drop of glycerine, screw it up into a tight ball and lay some twigs on top and while I'm off gathering bigger sticks my fire magically lights itself. I know that's not the preferred route to lighting a fire, but on a ideal day, with the right conditions, and surrounded by impressionable minds...

Still, it would be a breeze to adapt that. Take suitable container and prepare a nest of your favourites inside. In your core you'd have your KMnO4 on a bed of say fatwood shavings or shaved bits from a firelighter or something. Around that you could have your Vaseline drenched cotton wool or wax encrusted, whatever. Build your own from what works for you. You could probably getting a significant one time fire lighter inside a Kinder Egg. Rip it open – drop a drop of glycerine in – and bunch the contents back together. Labour and coordination to get it going would be so small. Tape a tiny tube with a few drops of gylcerine to the outside of the container. Eye flush or pet parasite treatments come in really small tubes for a start.

Notes.

1] The more glycerine you add the slower the reaction. You really only need a drop.
2] Although the reaction isn't violent the rapid expansion of the gas could give you a surprise. It's probably on a par with the Mentos in cola thing. As a child I'd make little ones with a Rizla full inside a push top plastic multivitamin container. The bang was just enough to make someone jump when you sat it down next to them, kinda like a champagne bottle badly opened. That said, I have blown old thermos flasks apart doing it. Just wrapped in paper or cotton wool none of this matters.
 
Good old Condy's Crystals! The information on using it for purifying water is so sketchy, it's scary. As an anti-fungal, it works well. I have a friend who has been a Pharmacist longer than I have been alive and he said that once upon a time, in douche form, it was used illegally as an abortive agent as well.

As THE TACO stated, just a drop of Glycerine is all that is required. Because temperature, humidity and a few other issues cause extreme ignition variables, never do this with the tinder you are working with anywhere near your face and don't hover with your face over the area of ignition. Do it at arm's length.

I would not store potassium permanganate and glycerine in the same kit, I would definitely keep them separate because if you took a fall or the kit suffered some type of damage, it might just ignite if they mixed...especially when you consider that you are probably carrying some type of tinder in the kit along with it, etc.

Tampons come with a string for the uninitiated... 8-) Spread the tampon out a bit... Place about a green pea-sized pile of potassium permanganate crystals and one drop of glycerine on that and wrap it quick with the string and place it in the center of a tinder pile, you will be amazed. Again, keep it away from your face and the smell of ignition, especially with a tampon, is just...just terrible. 8-)

Works good though!
 
I've mixed 1:1 sugar and potassium permanganate. works pretty well, and etholine glycol will set it off.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top