Emergency Firestarting

“Pocket solar parabolic fire starter...

http://store.sundancesolar.com/sospliposiso.html”

“My eyes!”

“Thanks techntrek. I am ordering 3 this pm”

“Yeah, don't try using that for a cigarette lighter.”

“Interesting!”

“In an emergency situation where I need a fire, bright sunlight is unlikely to be the prevailing weather condition ;-)”

“yeah, I'm not usually starting fires in the daylight. Hmmm”

““In an emergency situation where I need a fire, bright sunlight is unlikely to be the prevailing weather condition ;-)”
nogranola
3:42:24 PM
11/08/05

Killjoy! Burst their bubble. ;-)”

“For $10 get a Zippo. Guaranteed to light as long as you remember to fill it.”

““In an emergency situation where I need a fire, bright sunlight is unlikely to be the prevailing weather condition ;-)”

That's the beauty of the thing though. Then it becomes a rain catcher for drinking water. LOL!”

“Next time you are in camp in the evening with your warm clothes, sleepy bag and tent, with a roaring fire going, move left of the existing fire, and make another with wet wood and no use of any manmade object.

Near impossible, and the fact is you are warm, well fed, in one piece, and have the benifit of being able to see in the dark...

when the NEED for fire occurs, you will be injured, wet, cold, and without the means...unless you learn how and practice to start a fire NOW. When the clouds part and the rains stop you may well be a dry, sunlit corpse.”

“I rarely start a fire but can under 99.9% of circumstances including a driving rain. Once in my life, I used a fire starting aid in minus 20 degree weather where EVERYTHING was wet & encased in ice.

I bring a couple bic lighters. I bring matches too, usually in a 35mm film canister. I try to separate these items in case I lose my coat, pack etc in a emergency disaster.”

“Wax paper is a great little fire starter. It burns well and is fairly light. Also, those magnesium/steel things work. Butane lighters are great but don't work well when it gets really cold outside. I have never been good at "emergency fire starting". I tend to focus on keeping dry and making emergency shelters to stay dry and insulated. The inside of a good snow cave can be 30 degrees and that's a lot easier to survive in than 0 degrees fumbling around trying to make a fire (IMO).

I seldom make fires when I hike (typically solo hikes). I know its fun and entertaining, but I don't see it as a critical part of hiking. I guess if I got really wet (fell in a lake in cold weather, etc) I can see it as being critical. I might have to revisit this. I am pretty sure I could do it under fairly tough conditions but perhaps not in the sort of really bad ones someone posted.

When I get to camp I always gather firewood even though I don't make a fire. It's a just-in-case thing I have done for years. I'll leave it there for the next hiker or re-distribute the wood from where I picked it up. Weird habit. I don't know where I picked it up.”

“I have never had a bic lighter fail on me. I'm sure they probably do, but it hasn't happened to me yet..........

but....,.

We had a Sgt that was a chain smoker & always came into our office to get matches. He was a good guy but didn't function well under stress. So natuarally, I found a stapler where I had to special order these heavy duty staples. I'd staple the whole bunch of match covers shut. I don't know why he didn't just rip the cover to get at the matches, but he didn't. He HAD to get that giant staple out.This was hard to do & he said bad things to me.

So because he started to check these books of matches for this big staple, I started glueing the match heads together with elmers glue. This nearly put him over the edge, but he started examining the match books closely.
This took some pleasure from me.

My female (work) partner came up with the idea of smearing a drop of elmer's glue on the striker. I didn't think much of the idea at the time, but was I mistaken. He (& many, many others) would take these seemingly harmless matches & you could not get them to light. We had tears in our eyes watching people strike them maybe 10 times before (maybe) they could get one to light. This was hilarious. I learned new profane words (from over-exposure) every day.

One other relatively calm Sgt came to me in a fit-of-rage. Seems he has a farm and took a book of our matches to a back corner of his (large) farm to burn brush. These matches would not light. He was livid at the time, but laughs about it (now) 10 years later.

One canoe trip, I forgot (or lost) my bic lighters. I got my trusty matches out & guess what? Yup, every book I brought had a smeared drop of elmer's glue on the striker. They would not light, but I KNEW what the problem was. I tried scraping the striker against a rock to roughen it up, but I could not get a match to light (until) FINIALLY, I did get one to go after trying for quite a while.

So, if you're bored & know a campfire junkie or smoker...smear a drop of elmer's glue across the match book striker & let dry overnight. They will eventually do you bodily harm after you give yourself away by the tears streaming down your face.

The one other time the lynch mob tried to string me up, was for those little musical devices that come in electronic greeting cards. We used to pull them out & tuck it away in somebody's desk, office (corners are best) or locked area. People (for some reason)get murderous after hearing the same short melodious tune for a bazillion times. They're difficult to find & those watch batteries last about 3 days.....”

“I depend greatly upon my knife(s) in the woods. I keep them sharp & treasure them. I cannot bring myself to shave little slivers of metal off of a solid block. I don't care if it's titanium, ats34 or cm154. Can't do it.”

“A few weekends ago we got a fire going in the rain, everything was soaked. Spindle had a fire starter a la NJPacker. Cardboard egg carton filled with paraffin and dryer lint. It worked very well and we were gathered around the warm blaze all night.

A decent fire starter is just part of the equation. You have to know what to do with it of course.

http://community.webshots.com/photo/498774284/498807838HFiNlV”

“My buddy found this natural fire starter made out of heart pine or something. I picked some up at Wally World. The sap in the wood burns really well and the pieces are a little larger than a carpenters pencil.”

“You might be thinking of "fat wood" Jackstraw.”

“Here's one for you...

A length of Paracord or other line used with a rock or wet piece of wood tied to it's end, will allow you to harvest dead tree limbs from up above the ground...when the wood on the ground has been soaking wet for days, the dead branches overhead are nearly dry, all you have to do is get to them..toss the line over a dead branch and tug...I've used that method for years...”

“Just make sure you can dodge the branch on its way down!”

“...hey! mebbee THAT'S why my headaches are so bad...dang, an' all this time I thought it was the drinkin'.....”

“Nope, you were right, its the drinkin'. Once you've had a few you don't feel the branch hit you.”

“When you are on a well used trail, look for exposed evergreen roots. Many times the "injury" of hiking boots on the roots will casue the tree to "clot" inthe area. You can shave off the resin build-up (like heart wood) without killing the tree. Patsquach say - smell good, burn hot!

If you happen to be taking your time in the woods - check out those fallen pine trees. Many times a deposit of sap/nutrient can be found in the middle of a joint where a large limb extends from the tree. I have seen them in cone shape the size of a human head and you can light them like a candle.

Also - I have been told that pine cones are great fire starters. Maybe you could paste one up with parafin and dryer lint? Kind of like a fire starter grenade.

As far as the unnatural - I carry a tube of fire ribbon. Works every time.”

“So, if you're bored & know a campfire junkie or smoker...smear a drop of elmer's glue across the match book striker & let dry overnight. They will eventually do you bodily harm after you give yourself away by the tears streaming down your face.

catskhiker
7:04:23 PM
11/08/05


Along those lines, Thinkbubelz had a roommate in college who smoked. One day, just for fun, I stuck one of those cigarette "loads" (you know, the things that go "pop!") randomly in one of his roommates cigarettes.

We forgot about it and the next morning, when his roommate went to light his 1st cigarette, it exploded in his face.

Thinkbubelz nearly fell out of his chair laughing--he told me his roommate just had a look of utter shock on his face... LOL Sure wish I had been there to see his face....”

“Someone put one of those in my pack years ago in college. With a nearly full pack it happened to be my very next cig, so the pranksters were around to see it go off. We all got a good laugh about it.”

“I put one in a collegue's cigarette a few years back & it went off inside a maximum security prison. The head honcho hit the floor.

Did it to me & a piece of tobacco went in my eye (burns) so I stopped doing that one.”

“I will just stick to cottonballs, vaseline, and waterproof matches.

There may be better "gizmos" out there, but nothing any more practical.”

“Apparently cockroaches and rubbing alcohol work really, really well.

http://www.local6.com/spotlight/14079874/detail.html”

“No one was injured in the fire.

Except for the cockroaches.”

“....setting cockroaches on fire for fun.......”

“LOL..(I am sorry) but there is a visual of the two kids putting acholhol on a cockroach, lighting it and watching the flaming roach scurry under a bed...Talk about REALITY setting in....(LOL)

You know one of the fun parts of my job is hearing the "stories" of people. One of my favorites was kid whose parents had taken off for the evening for dinner and a movie. Junior called his sweetie over and they decided to "build a fire" in the fireplace. Junior put four 'logs" (about 2 inches in diameter) in the fireplace. And he lit them. Well junior had put four HUGE pieces of Fatlighter in the fireplace. They took off like a rocket engine. (LOL)

The alarm system goes off, Junior jumps up, grabs the extinguisher, and starts at the door to the living room spraying powder all over the living room....(LOL)”