First Batch of Char Cloth

[Guyon]

I'd never made any until today. I just have relied on other ignition materials. But my wife wanted some old receipts burned this morning, so I took advantage of the opportunity.
Here's my cloth--old t-shirt cut into roughly 1.5" squares. Sorry, no pictures of the cookies we ate first. You can see the smoke hole I drilled in the tin's lid.

I had a nice bed of coals ready in the fire bowl.

Here's the tin just after I put it in the coals. It began smoking immediately.

And then it really started spurting.

Couple more smoking pics follow. All told, I left the tin in the coals about 20 minutes.
It had actually stopped smoking a minute or two before I removed it.
During the process, I turned it once to make sure the heat was distributed evenly off that bank of coals in the background.

Cool down.

The blackened payoff.

That's it. I'm going to give the char cloth some tests with sparks and see what I can do with it.

 

[L4NE4]

Looks good! I make charcloth almost every time we have a fire in the fireplace.

 

[Mountain Wildman]

Cool, I was just thinking about making char cloth last night.
I've never made any either, I was thinking about using old blue jeans.
Please post your test results on the T-shirt char cloth.

 

[L4NE4]

Cool, I was just thinking about making char cloth last night.
I've never made any either, I was thinking about using old blue jeans.
Please post your test results on the T-shirt char cloth.

Blue jeans work great. I have found that womens jeans (thinner) burn faster.

Oh and be very careful when making charcloth out of the butt of the jeans...

 

[Mountain Wildman]

Blue jeans work great. I have found that womens jeans (thinner) burn faster.

Oh and be very careful when making charcloth out of the butt of the jeans...

I don't have any womens jeans, Don't like the way they fit

 

[machineage]

I was wondering what you use the charcloth for? I've never heard of this but I do art work and I'm always looking for interesting material. Thanks

 

[Hesparus]

My favorite thing to make char out of is punk wood. It's harder to pack than char cloth, but it's fantastic for starting fires. Once it takes a spark you can go straight to small kindling.

- Chris

 

[upnorth]

I've seen this process before but never tried it, pretty cool with the smoke\escaping gases. :thumbup: I never did find an original fur trade fire steel but a buddy of mine has found several.....Now I want butter cookies !

 

[Lou Castle]

I don't have any womens jeans, Don't like the way they fit

You don't want your fire to look fat in that charcloth, do you?

 

[Guyon]

You don't want your fire to look fat in that charcloth, do you?

Quoted for truth.

 

[Guyon]

Just an FYI.
In response to a duplicate thread I started over on Bushcraft USA, a kind poster sent me a link to his thread on char cloth.
It is very informative and worth a look: http://bushcraftusa.com/forum/showthread.php/79827-Charring-cloth-is-an-anaerobic-process

 

[sitka]

Charcloth is used to catch the first spark typically from a flint and stel. It creates a hot ember that can be fanned to catch additional material like kindling . Sorry, thought I had Machineage's question in here.

 

[Guyon]

Mine seems to take a spark just fine, but I haven't tried to transfer it yet.

 

[Quirt]

My favorite thing to make char out of is punk wood. It's harder to pack than char cloth, but it's fantastic for starting fires. Once it takes a spark you can go straight to small kindling.

- Chris

Chris do you char the punk wood like Cotten first? If so for how long?

 

[LG&M]

Good stuff, it's about time I make some more. I used old T shirts last time but I want to try jeans. Just don't have any I can cut up with out getting in trouble.

 

[Woods Walker]

Glad you did it, now toss some in your fire kit. Works real nice in the Altoids kits.

You can also char natural materials like cattail and punkwood.

 

[machineage]

Thanks Sitka. Learned somthin new today.

 

[schmittie]

Thank you for not only sharing your experience, but taking such good pictures as well. Very nicely done. This IS on my list of things to do one day.

 

[Don'tkillbill2.0]

Here's one of my first batches. An easy city method anyone should be able to do.

[video=youtube_share;qaXfUkCSrPQ]http://youtu.be/qaXfUkCSrPQ[/video]

I like your scale of project enough charcloth to last a while.

 

[Rupestris]

This is my char cloth can. It's a 4oz paint can I got at work as a demo from one of out can suppliers. I use denim/jeans cut into 1.5" wide strips and loosely roll them up in the can.

Because it is so small it turns out a batch in no time. If I screw one up I just let it cool, refill and go again.

ETA: congrats Guyon on your first batch and as stated, thanks for the great pics.