Practical Survival Skills 101 - Fire Starting

Resilient Life Public Resilient Life
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21

Great stuff! A couple of years ago I got intrigued by fire pistons. They’re interesting technology that makes fire using air compression just like a diesel engine. I worked out my own design (they’re pretty simple and there are lots of designs on the Internet) and keep a few around in kits for firemaking. I’ve never messed with fire drills or such – I should do that just to add the skills.
The point about practising on the woodstove is a good one. I use a fire piston to get the woodstove going, partly to stay in practice, partly for the fun of it (kids and fire, eh!) and partly because I can brag about how this fire piston that took me five bucks to build just saved me a five-cent match. Smile

My fire kit looks like this:

  • matches in waterproof container (change them every two months!)
  • fire piston
  • char-cloth in sealed container
  • small jar of Vaseline (lubricates the fire piston)
  • magnesium firestarter
  • birch bark
  • small magnifying glass
  • replacement o-ring seals for fire piston
I want to have as many options available as possible. I'm also exploring small stoves that use wood, such as Worldstove's "Beaner" stove, and small fan-forced wood cookstoves. Having a fire for heat is good. Containing that fire in a way that lets you cook or melt snow over it is also good.

Looking forward to more!

22

Wow - lots of responses…
First and foremost - thanks to all of you for the kind words and added advice.
As all things, the commentary and dialog here is what makes these worth doing. So thank you all for sharing your experience and lessons learned.

I’m sorry I can’t get to all the questions right now, but this one stands out in particular:

[quote]

Aaron, an intrigueing comment you made in your excellent article that grabbed me was  "Are there tactical or situational factors that make a high visibility fire a liability?"

An issue like that probably merits an article all by itself.  There are situations when a fire will cause more trouble than the comfort it will provide.  In certain situations, you want to avoid broadcasting your whereabouts and you want to avoid inviting troublemakers into your camp.  Here are some preventive measures that I might take if I found myself in a dicey situation.[/quote]

Osb,

This is spot on. For right now, this primer (and the rest of the series) will be the "street-fight" version of these skills; how to get the job done quickly, effectively and in such a way where you'll have a solid knowledge base upon which you add your own experience. 

However, security issues are a multi-verse unto themselves - they change rapidly based on your situation, location, topography, the state of civil order, ad infinitum; There are ways of performing these tasks (Shelter, Fire, Water etc) while trying to be discreet, but at present, I'm still only in the "planning" stages of working up a primer on general security, and I'd really like to have more minds in on the project to attack it from more angles.

Just like firebuilding, all these tasks are going to vary by location, so people "chipping in" with what works in their area is absolutely indispensable in making these threads valuable to all.

Thank you all so much for the kind words and great comments.

Aaron

23

Just want to say this is a great article and I look forward to your future posts.
Cheers!

 

Lyndsey

24

Aaron,
Thanks much.  Two thumbs up!  Looking forward to more!

25

Greetings all! 
I’ve been waiting for an excuse to rejoin the many conversations here on CM.  I took a sabatical earlier this year when I bought a place in Alaska- took a lot of time learning new “northern” skills and starting the prep work on the property- so didn’t have much time for the community here…Great to be back though!

Great stuff Aaron, as usual.

  One trick I learned from one of my new-found friends, when trying to start a fire to burn off some of the slash from lot clearing when it was constantly drizzling.  This is a kind of “boat-breaks-down-in-a-remote-area” scenario.  This supposes you have a bit of gasoline on hand.  No problem you say.  Well, folks have been known to throw gallons of gas on a pile of sticks and still not have a mature fire to show for it.  So, cut one of your soda cans in half, bury the bottom half in the dirt and put a few ounces of gas in it.  Build the tee-pee over it and light the gas.  It won’t explode, but will rather burn for a real long time, enough to get your fire going great.  I was amazed at how useful this was- providing you have gas…what an incredible gift, eh?

A medicine bottle filled with petroleum product-soaked cotton balls and a magnesium stick is definately basic equipment!  Thanks to all for posting your great tips!

Sager- a second on the Jack London story!  I was thinking the same thing.  Get chills just thinking about that story. 

Aloha, Steve

26

Wow, and I just realized I joined CM exactly 2 years and 51 minutes ago!  Thanks Chris, staff, and all you fellow posters who bring such value and community to my life!  Aloha, Steve.

27

Aaron,
Excellent article. 

For wet conditions, I have also used cotton wool balls soacked in vaseline and a fire steel to get things moving.  It burns very hot for long enough to dry out tinder/kindling.  If trekking, I normally carry 5 or 6 presoaked balls in a small platic bag.

28

Steve,

Out of curiosity, which area of AK did you buy your property?  We live in Palmer in the Mat-su Valley, and I do remote work in the Delta Junction/Fort Greely area.  The only other CM’ers I know here are PlicketyCat and Gungnir, but they are far away (a few hours west of Fairbanks).

What Aaron says about the Pacific NW applies to much of Alaska too… plenty of stuff to burn, but it’s usually wet.  The panhandle and Aleutian chain is probably the worst, but parts of Southcentral Alaska are consistently wet too.  I’ve never used the gas in a soda can method, but it sounds interesting.  Every time I’ve been camping there’s been no shortage of birch around, and never had enough problems getting a fire going to where we were tempted to break out the gasoline. 

 

And I just want to second what LG said… I don’t smoke but I always carry a lighter with me, and keep a couple disposable Bics in my car and emergency bags.  These things are just so handy, cheap, and small there’s no reason not to have some scattered around in your car, house, and on your person.  I have a couple magnesium/striker units in the emergency bags, but that’s for last resort.  I’ve started a fire with one of those just to try it out, but really I’d rather just use a lighter and save time.  As Aaron has shown just getting everything in place to build up a proper fire and keep it going for hours takes enough time and effort, and if I’m in any sort of emergency situation I want to keep things as simple as possible.  I leave the more primitive firestarting methods for when we’re camping and have a lot of time to fart around

  • Nickbert
29

Nickbert-
 I was smitten by the people and beauty (and relatively affordable land prices) of Prince of Wales Island.  Just a summer spot for now…I hear they’re getting maybe 7 hours of daylight these days…but you know about that, eh?  Anybody know how Gungnir and PC are doing?  Didn’t they have a blog detailing their adventures?  Happy Holidays to all!  Aloha, Steve.

30

Steve,
Wow, you’re quite a ways away.  Never been to Prince of Wales Island myself, but I’d like to see it one of these days.  PC and Gungnir still have their blog (http://www.jenninewardle.com/) and are still chugging along.  Give their blog a look, they update it pretty regularly.

(I wish they were close enough to visit and see their place for myself, but they’re over 10 hours away from Palmer and over 6 hours from my work location. This state can be overwhelmingly big sometimes). 

  • Nickbert
31

Thank you for a great article! I am more motivated to practice with my flint and steel now. What do you mean by first line gear? Is there a second line? Maybe this is coming in another article. I always carry a headlamp, matches, jackknife w/scissors in my purse but is that enough?

32

M.E.,
There’s one more article coming, and it’ll cover how to assemble your gear based on several “definitions” of emergencies.

Basically, your first line is all the things you should carry on a daily basis… it becomes very difficult when discussing lines of equipment for women because, sadly, women’s clothing is not geared for “usefulness”. 

Typically, a purse would be a “second line” or equipment carried off your clothing - examples of this could be anything from a chest rig or camera bag to a purse or handbag.

That said - carrying those things all the time is an excellent start, and a good indicator of mindset!
My EDC (everday carry) includes:

  • Multi-tool
  • Pocket knife
  • P38 can opener
  • Thumb Drive
  • Lighter
  • Folding notebook with Pens and miscellaneous gear, etc.

Basically, it’s the items you’d “need” to accomplish the bare minimums of survival without the headache of using flint and rocks as tools. Properly constructed, your 1st line should facilitate you getting anything else you might need.

Hopefully this is helpful to answering your question without giving away too much of the next episode =)

Cheers,

Aaron