petroleum jelly and cotton balls question

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fatcat55

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Jan 1, 2010
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How do you prepare these? Is the cotton ball just covered in PJ or is the PJ worked into the cotton ball and saturated?

Is there a right or wrong way to do this?

I made some and used magnesium shavings and the flint striker to start the fire. Needless to say, it was more difficult than I expected.

I have started fires with other tinder and magnesium and flint and steel and it was not as difficult as using the cotton balls so I wanted to make sure I was getting the essentials prepared correctly.

Thanks in advance.
 
PJCBs and a striker are my preferred method of fire-starting.

I like to apply a generous coating of Petroleum Jelly and work it in a bit. I leave the interior 'dry', though. I find that it works best when I break the PJCB open, expose the dry interior, and hit it with some sparks from my striker.

You might also try pushing two cotton balls together and then coating the exterior of this combined ball. It gives you more material to work with.

Let us know how it goes!

All the best,

- Mike
 
understand ive never used them but...
when i watched videos of them being lit
the user fluffed with a knife or striker
dragging some of the fibers up creating more surface area to catch.
a lump cotton ball is prob difficult to catch

good luck
 
They arn't my favorite method. But I've been playing with them recently.

The total amount of PJ used seems to be a personal preference thing. But you need to leave some dry fibers to catch the spark.

The simplest way is to whipe one side through the tub of PJ, have one side saturated and caked with it, and the other side is dry. Even when you pack them together, one side should stay fluffy enough.

A more labor intensive way is to put the PJ inside the ball,kinda like a jelly doughnut. Not too hard to do if you have a syringe of some type.
 
Works great-work the jelly into the cotton and fluff up when sparking. I keep these in all my kits. :thumbup:
 
flatten the soaked cotton on a piece of foil and fold/seal

cut an x in the foil fluff and light

can burn by itself for a good while like a candle
 
Thanks for the quick responses. Will be doing some experimenting based on these suggestions.
 
I just put both components into a ziplock and knead them from the outside. Then transfer them to a clean bag for storage.
 
One way I make PJCBs is by putting a generous glob of PJ in a zip lock baggie, adding some CBs, and then working the CBs around inside the baggie until they are adequately coated and saturated to my liking. Another way is to work one CB at a time in a PJ jar and coat/saturate it that way.

I pack my PJCBs in film canisters, pill bottles, empty bottles from blood glucose meter test strips, and match cases. When needed, I pull them out with a little stick.
 
I like to get my cotton balls thoroughly saturated with PJ. I stuff mine into my RAT/ESEE fire kit and keep a small Vic SAK attached. It works great as a striker and the tweezers are useful for pulling out strands of the PJCBs.

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I use small cotton balls, the cheapest I can get at the local grocery store. Get a small amount of PJ on my index finger and thumb, rub it into a cotton ball and store in a water proof container. You can store tons of the smalls ones in a film canister or match case.

Normally you only need one cotton ball to start a fire. Pull one out, fluff it up (expose the inside thats still kind of dry) and hit with sparks from your favorite rod. When done correctly they burst into flames and last long enough to start dry twigs.

Keep some fatwood in your kit for a great combo.
 
I started packing some into little aluminum containers about the size of an old 35mm film canister. Getting them out can be a bit of a pain, you can do it with a stick.

But my prefered way is to put a loop of jute twine on the bottom of the canister with both ends sticking out. You can then get any stuck at the bottom by pulling on the string. ...kinda like those ribbons that are in some devices that use batteries to aid extraction.
 
Sounds like about half in favor of completely saturating the CBs and about half in favor of coating the exterior of the CBs but not complete saturation. Thanks again for all the good info and ideas.
 
I find the cotton balls are the easiest way to start a sparked fire of any "tinder" I've tried.
I rub some Vaseline on the outside most of the way around the cotton ball, don't bother to soak it or work it in much (I'm very lazy), when it's time to use just spread it out a little and drop the sparks on it.
With or without Vaseline, cottonballs will take off with no more than two or three strikes from a ferro rod for me.
With Vaseline, they burn much longer, allowing time & sustained heat for the secondary tinder to catch.

Denis
 
You don't need dry inner fibers for them to light easily. You just need ones that aren't completely surrounded with globs of PJ.

We used to sell these before all the melting PJ gave me intense headaches, so I've made more PJ cotton balls than I care to admit. These work better, compact smaller, and burn longer than any other method that I have tried. They also are not nearly as messy as the ones where you just smear the PJ on. I hate having PJ covered fingers when I am trying to start a fire.

What you will need:

1. Heat source (I used my kitchen stove)
2. PJ
3. Cotton balls
4. Film canister or a similar container
5. Needle nose pliers
6. Gloves

Here is what I did:

1. Melt the PJ on a stove (use a double boiler so you do not catch your kitchen on fire).
2. While wearing the gloves (melted PJ is hot!), put 2-3 cotton balls in the melted PJ and let them soak up a bit of the PJ.
3. Using the pliers, take the soaked cotton balls and stuff them inside the film canister. Hold the canister at an angle so the excess drains.
4. Start stuffing in dry cotton balls. They will soak up the excess PJ from the first few. Cram them in as tight as you can.
5. If there is ever not some melted PJ pooling up in the canister when you cram them in, put a cotton ball in the pot and get a bit more. You do not want any part of them to be dry for this method to work properly.

Be sure to drain the excess melted PJ and cram a bunch in there. They get nice and compact and will be completely saturated with PJ, so they burn a long time while not being so saturated that they are hard to light. I usually put 10 large cotton balls in one film canister, but you could fit 15 or more if you really crammed.

Maybe I'll make a video for it one of these days. :D
 
I turn a ziplock bag inside out, wipe a bunch of PJ onto it (I have a large tub), and turn it rightside out, throw in some cotton balls, seal, and work them into it. Like others, I pull one out, fluff it and light.

You can also take them, one by one, and encase them in duct tape. Two strips of duct tape in a + shape will do it, then if you need one, just cut a slit into the tape and pull some cotton out, and hit it with a lighter or ferrocerium rod.
 
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