Skills:PSK (ITEM 7 IS UP!): A Group Exercise in Creative Thinking and Improvisation

If you need to sacrifice the radio to Dread Murphy, battery+wire+plastic (rendered into fine shavings or particles) = fire.
 
xd, Thomas - good stuff. Assume, for the sake of this exercise that the radio konked out but the battery is good.
 
Food: Snap off the antenna and use it to fashion a small spear point for fish; or use the antenna as a whip for small critters like lizards, possibly combine with hook & line as fishing rod (is it cheating to use previous items with kit?).

Plastic part of the housing might be used as a shovel to scrape or dig in the ground.
 
I just read the first page on fishing hooks sorry to add this late.Not sure if this counts, but frogs are easy to catch on a hook baited with a worm, or bright cloth. Turtles are also easily caught with them. I have used larger hooks, that I have annealed straightened and cut the tip off of as part of an "ishi" type pressure flaker. They also make a decent awl with the barb removed. You could also I imagine use a piece of one with a bow drill, as a bit to bore small holes in bone, or shells.
 
With just line you can tie it down to a fixed object and slide it through bait spaced out at several spots on the line. if a bird starts feasting, it wont be able to get away because of the 1m tangled line it just ingested.

Got that tip from one of Ray Mears shows, thought it was a good idea.
 
camo kid and cuphead (that sounds like a cartoon superhero duo...:D) -- good stuff!

The best survival items from GI were Ginger AND Mary Ann....;)
 
a radio;
i know very little about radios, so i would have to actually take one apart to figure out what's inside that useable.

though in theory you can use a bit of wire (or steel wool, or our tin foil) to catch a spark off of the battery. never tried it myself.

i suppose someone that is handy with radios could maybe make a way to signal basic morse code with one?

you could use it to identify what the weather report is to know if you should spend more energy on shelter or food...
 
Ok, fishhook/line, tin foil, or transistor radio components. Anyone else? Just free associate --even if you think it's unlikely -- throw it out here!
 
frequently those small portable radios have indicator LEDs, you could easily remove one of those LEDs from the circuit board, and use some wire and the battery to fashion a makeshift flashlight. It most likely wouldn't last very long, I think the voltage from a 9 volt would burn out a small led pretty fast, but it might be enough to help navigate some terrain, or light/relight a fire.
 
Okay, I'm in, late in the game...

Line: Improv shoelaces, bindings and lashings for snowshoes, lashings for splints, tourniquet (as a very last resort, you will likely lose that appendage if used this way), and of course the very controversial garrote :eek: .

Hook: Ah..I can;t think of anything that hasn't already been said.

Foil: insulation inside your clothing, under your blanket, maybe an airtight bandage for a sucking chest wound to prevent a pneumothorax, an antenna.

Transistor radio: probably has a board inside made of G-10 that could be sharpened to use as a cutting tool; It has many wires for lashing a sharp tip (like a piece of G-10) to a pole; if the front part of the cover has many tiny holes it could be used as a strainer or sunglasses; the speaker cone has a magnet in it doesn't it? You could use it like a large scale version of the magnetized needle on a floating leaf (theoretical on my part), like on a flat piece of wood or the radio cover if it floats (maybe if it was lined with foil). There's also a lot of thin copper wire in the cone that could be used for sewing or emergency sutures die to its antimicrobial properties; theres also screws and washers in there that could be used in some way. If you happen to have spare batteries you can connect two 9V batteries (they have one male and on female terminal each) together creating a short circuit and generate enough heat to maybe ignite some tinder.

Okay, now I have a headache.

Okay I'm cheating on this last one as I looked it up but you can open up a 9V battery and there are six mini batteries that with some tweaking can be made to replace AAA batteries in a light.
 
Nice job, guys.

Marcelo, it DOES wrack the brain doesn't it? Imagine having to be this creative under the intense stress of a real survival emergency, and being exhausted or injured.
 
I guess I can post something instead of lurking all the time.

SIGUY said it before about tin foil and making a cup to hold water. I have never had any luck with that at all. Everytime I opened up the tin foil it leaked, and held just a little bit of water.

I can still boil all my water all at once in it.

What I do is I make the tin foil cup and fill it with as much water as it will hold. Then I fill it with water about two inches worth and I have never been able to have the small cup hold more than that before leaking.

I have a home made FOODSAVER bag that I cut and made to fit in my PSK tin. Mine are 4'' wide and 9'' long. I made one side that has the neck about another 4'' longer and an inch wide. Basically the bag looks like a and "L" with the vertical part the filler neck and the horizontal part as the main part of the bag. I made them like this so I can fold the neck closed and then use a twist tie on them so they don't leak.

Anyway, I fill the bag with water and put it in the tin foil cup with just a little water in it. It will boil the water in my bag without melting it. Kind of like a double boiler. Depending on how much water the cup holds, I may add just a little so it doesn't go dry.

I form the tin foil to support the FOODSAVER bag and to protect it from burning or melting. I can still use the tin foil for cooking if I really want to, but to be honest, I never have. The tin foil always holds enough water to do this, but never enough, at least for me, to boil enough water to make it worth while. I have had to use a couple sticks to help support the foil cup or lean it against a chunk of wood.

The bags are made to be boiled, so there is no chance of it melting while in the boiling water. I don't put it right on the fire, but right next to it.

I hope I explained that well enough. Maybe I should go back to lurking. :o
 
a snapped off attena can be used as a blow tube to religth a fire...the battery with the tinfoil or some wire and fine tinder might aid in lighting a fire...sharp bits of plastic from abroken radio can be used as a cutting edge or as a point o a spear or other tool to prolong the edge life of your knife (should you have one) Tinfoil could be used to collect water....possibly to signal, as a waterproof shingle ona shelter...and to make a cool robot mask...fishing line could be used to fish also can be used to lash shelter supports sew together damaged clothing or gear..to make any number of traps or snares...or a primitive weapon like a bolo...fishhooks can be used to gig small game or can be straghtend and used as awls or needles
 
Foil: Use it to collect and/or transport magnesium or fatwood shavings.

Radio: Unfortunately most modern radios use components that are surface mounted and are pretty much impossible to remove without the correct tools. I like the idea of using an LED and the battery to make an improvised flashlight. The voltage would have to be stepped down to make this work as most LEDs can only handle 3-5 volts depending in the type. One way to step down the voltage is to use a resistor between the battery and the LED. An earlier post mentioned that the 9V consists of smaller internal cells. The right number of cells could be combined to provide close to the correct voltage for the LED.

Somebody mentioned modifying it to transmit morse code. Sorry but the transistor radio has no transmitting capacity. Based on what I know about FCC rules I doubt there are any components inside the radio that could be combined to make a transmitter. There is more regarding radios but I have already wandered to far off the main point already.
 
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