New skills

[Aftershock]

Hi all,

have decided to start on some new skills. The first one being, how to start a fire. So for the last two nights, Been in the back garden trying a few ideas. The first was with cotton balls and Vaseline, after some sticky fingers, they burnt quite well. Next time I'll melt the Vaseline into the cotton balls some good video's on YouTube.

Tonight used a tea light, well two tea lights, the first one, I let the tinder get too close to the flame at first, extinguishing the flame.
Second time, learned the lesson...

Small steps at first, right?

Well enough for now,

Cheers

Chris

M.F.F.M

[Lanky Yankee]

Nice one. I've been working on this with my boy as well. Never really tried it until recently, but now the boy thinks we can go and live in the woods for month because we made fire.

[Aftershock]

Hi Lanky,

thanks for the reply. Trying new skills to show my grandchildren, only 2 and 3 years old, so figure have some time to learn them, before I pass them on.

Chris

[Arzosah]

Thats a good idea. I worked hard at making expedient stoves, but I haven't actually practised fire making yet In the meantime, I have a camping gaz stove Let us know how you get on!

[featherstick]

Hi all,

have decided to start on some new skills. The first one being, how to start a fire. So for the last two nights, Been in the back garden trying a few ideas. The first was with cotton balls and Vaseline, after some sticky fingers, they burnt quite well. Next time I'll melt the Vaseline into the cotton balls some good video's on YouTube.

Tonight used a tea light, well two tea lights, the first one, I let the tinder get too close to the flame at first, extinguishing the flame.
Second time, learned the lesson...

Small steps at first, right?

Well enough for now,

Cheers

Chris

M.F.F.M

Good move, always worth trying new skills out. If you leave the vaseline and the cotton balls separate, you have more versatility - vaseline for lubrication, chapped lips or fire-making, cotton wool for ears, cleaning wounds or fire-making.

[izzy_mack]

Good idea, also a good idea to remind those that have already done this to go back to basics and have a practice run of skills already learned. I have done this once or twice and it's amazing how much slower you are when you haven't done something for a while not to mention how often you make a mistake when you should have known better.

Also to try out other methods, my list of how to do things , is always growing as I pick up new ideas and snippets of info, mostly from this site, and I haven't yet tried out for myself.

Good luck with the grandkids, bet they're loving it and looking forward to their next adventure.

[Aftershock]

Hi all

Thanks for your replies, they are most welcome. Unfortunately, I cannot see how i can reply to you all individually, am I missing something?

Thanks for the tip on keeping stuff separate, will use that for my car bag.

Any tips for when buying a magnesium fire starter? Seen cheap ones on Amazon. £1-2, some good reviews to more expensive ones £10+

Cheers for reading and replying.

Chris

[Ward8G]

I think the importance of practising fundamental skills can't be stressed enough.. and in my opinion it doesn't come any more fundamental than making fire. Of course, making fire using only basic tools would only really become necessary in a 'worst case scenario', as I'm sure all of you, like me, carry a far easier method of making fire as our first choice, (mine is a "True Utility Firestash" on my keyring), but still, it's not just about the actual fire lighting, it's about finding fuel that burns well, and is dry.. and the best way to arrange your stones, etc, etc...

Has anyone else practised making a basic water filter from a scavenged bottle, then filtered and boiled water from a stream in the woods? ... did you drink the water?

[ForgeCorvus]

Aftershock: You won't be able to send Individual Messages until you've got ten posts.
When you say magnesium fire starter do you mean a Ferrocerium rod (otherwise known as a firesteel) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferrocerium, or a Doan bar
?

[nickdutch]

Fire starting is good fun. When you get it right and you get a flame going you think you have conquered everything, but get the ingredients a bit off, or try it in conditions that aren't optimal (humidity affecting the tinder, wind etc.) and then things are different and you can get a bit panicky because you sussed it once and you cant work out what is wrong.