Natural and man-made firesteel tinder.

[Woods Walker]

People often pack a firesteel in their BOB but like any gear item practice is paramount. Skills and knowledge are equally important to physical ownership of gear. Here is a list of both natural and man-made tinders being ignited with a firesteel. Clearly there are far more option available so feel free to expand the list and post some fire.

Natural tinder.

1. Wood shavings in this case Eastern White pine.

It took maybe 10 strikes. I almost gave up but then the shavings ignited.



2. Fatwood.

Fatwood can be found in the dead stumps, the base of branches and roots of pine trees.



Maybe 3 or more strikes and the fatwood shavings ignited. It could have been done with fewer but my attention to detail was slack. I used a fallen Tulip Poplar tree as a platform in the dark after a long hike. Once ignited it burns good.





3. True tinder fungus aka chaga.

Found this on a White Birch tree.



It was high and needed a long stick to pry away a piece. When foraging I never take everything from one area therefore the rest is probably still on that White birch.



After weeks drying it’s time to put the chaga to the firesteel test. Cut easy and this was a good sign. The less woody the better.



After the first strike it had multiple embers.



A minute later things were clearly going in the right direction.



Embers don’t equal flames and didn’t make a tinder bundle but had the next two contestants on hand.



About 20 seconds of blowing and smoked out eyes later I had flames.





Some very puffy tinder can flash over fast. If this bundle was being used to start a fire there would have been more tinder and kindling ready.



4. Common Reed.

I mostly find the invasive variety in my AO growing around water. They look a bit like cattails but have major differences.



The upper fluffy part works great for a firesteel tinder.



One strike was enough. This will flash over fast so best to act accordingly.



5. Yellow Birch.

I find this growing along rivers but isn’t limited to those areas.





It took 3-4 strikes. Often if the bark is fluffy one strike would be enough. Like White birch when Yellow birch bark ignites you know it. Birch bark is my favorite firesteel natural tinder.



6. Cattails

Cattails grow around water.



The upper brown hot dog looking part works well for tinder. It has to be fluffed up.



One strike and it flashes to life.



Because it flashes fast the tinder can be flipped over to fan the flames.



Man-made firesteel tinder.

1. Dryer lint.
2. Alcohol swab.
3. 2x2 gauze pad mixed with triple anti bacterial cream.
4. Toilet paper.
5. Denatured alcohol to be ignited in a DIY burner.



Dryer lint flamed on the first strike.



Alcohol swab flamed on the first strike.



2x2 gauze pad mixed with triple anti bacterial cream took 3 strikes. The cream is mostly petroleum jelly aka Vaseline and increased the burn but it was a bit hard to fluff up that gauze pad. Still it burned good.



Toilet paper flamed on second strike but the first was half hearted.



Denatured alcohol to be ignited in a DIY burner flamed on the first strike.



Thanks for looking.

[werepig]

Very cool thanks for posting!

[xxxDarksidexxx]

very nice WW. i have 10 man made tinders im taking into the woods with me this weekend for a little fire steel demonstration. i also have 4 different fatwoods which ill be taking along as well. im also going to forage for some other natural tinders in the woods and demostrate lighting those with a firesteel. also made some homemade maya dust this evening...

Skills and knowledge are equally important to physical ownership of gear.

a firesteel is a great little tool, and with some practice almost anyone can learn how to use one. i have, over time tweaked my skills with a fire steel and have become pretty good at lighting all kinds of crap on fire.

ill admit when i first started using one i was doing it a bit wrong. almost anyone can light a cotton ball on fire, but other tinders require you to really know how to use the tool the correct way. this is importent as you may need to light tinders in the field that dont burts into flames at the sight of a firestell like a cotton ball will.

i will add to this after my trip this weekend.

[dogbane]

All of those natural materials are available in the Southeast except the birches, but we have red or river birch here, and the bark makes a really nice tinder. I'll dig out the firesteel and see how it compares.

Nice write up of a good series of experiments. Experience is the best teacher.

[Woods Walker]

Darkside.

Sounds great. Hand sanitizer makes for a good tinder as well so better toss that in. The cottonball and Vaseline combo works wonders and is my primary tinder even when using a Bic. I ignored that in favor of items someone might have on hand if not intentionally packing tinder. Their FAK could have an alcohol pad, triple antibacterial cream (mostly petroleum jelly aka Vaseline) and a gauze pad. A person might also carry TP in their pack and forget that's great tinder if under stress. They could have alcohol for their stove as well. I never had drier lint in my pocket but had a hankering to use it.

[dogbane]

Are there synthetics in your dryer lint?

[Woods Walker]

All of those natural materials are available in the Southeast except the birches, but we have red or river birch here, and the bark makes a really nice tinder. I'll dig out the firesteel and see how it compares.

Nice write up of a good series of experiments. Experience is the best teacher.

Thanks. That seems like a good plan.

Are there synthetics in your dryer lint?

Guessing a mix of everything.

[Woods Walker]

Very cool thanks for posting!

Thanks and welcome to ZS.

[Blackdog]

This has been up before and is probably old hat but here goes.

There is a long list of organic items that can be charred and then used as tinder. Fungus, some punk wood, cotton, silk, on and on.

Here is a chunk of fungus that I charred and it worked just fine as a tinder. It was not tinder fungus and I didn't have to dry it first.

Packed in a can.




After charring.




Finished product after catching a spark.

[Blackdog]

Then good ol' everybody knows this one, cotton char cloth.

[MikeM]

When my wife starts her gardening projects in the Spring I like to grab a ziploc bag worth of cedar gardening mulch. Lasts me more than a season of camping and works great as a tinder source. It runs about $4 a bag in the gardening center at Wally World.

[jamesraykenney]

Have you tried these with flint and steel? It produces a MUCH cooler spark and thus is much harder to get an ember or flame.
What is good to use?(besides charcloth, which, of course, works great!)

[Woods Walker]

Have you tried these with flint and steel? It produces a MUCH cooler spark and thus is much harder to get an ember or flame.
What is good to use?(besides charcloth, which, of course, works great!)

Chaga should work but I never tested that with a Flint and steel.

[xxxDarksidexxx]

playing with FIRE...

i decided to do some firesteel demonstrations on a recent trip. im no expert at working a firesteel, but i have had plenty of practice as i love all things fire. as you watch my videos you may see me use my fire steel different ways as i belive there is no one single one way to light all tinder with a firesteel. sometimes you need to get in close, while other times i feel you need to back off a bit. you do need some basic mechanics, but i belive that to be successfull with a firesteel you need to be able to "read" your tinder, and sparks and adjust your technique if needed. i think almost anyone can be shown how to light a cotton ball in five seconds, but the ONLY way you will be successfull at lighting many other materials is practice, practice, practice. besides being fun IMO knowing how to use a firesteel on common natural tinders in your AO could someday save you life.

while walking in the woods i found some bees wax. i used this along with my natural tinders to prolong the burn time by dropping some into my tinder bundle after it was on fire. the video demostrating this didnt turn out so well so im just posting the video we shot without me using the bees wax. i did 5 natural tinders....

1 - palm tree fibers
2 - dead spanish moss
3 - dead palm frond
4 - punk wood
5 - fat wood ( in the man made tinder video )

CLICK THE IMAGES BELOW TO WATCH THE VIDEOS

palm tree fibers and dead spanish moss...



dead palm frond...



punk wood...



here i am doing 10 man made tinders with fire steel. some are the same type but 10 seperate man made items. i also did the fatwood on this video as the 5th natural tinder. in the video i said 9 things, but it was actually 11 things inc the fatwood.

CLICK THE IMAGES BELOW TO WATCH THE VIDEOS


1 - char choth
2 - weber fire starter
3 - birthday candle
4 - candle wick soaked in parrafin
5 - UCO storm proof match
6 - coleman water proof match
7 - large strike any where match
8 - dryer lint
9 - fatwood
10 - pre made magnesium shavings
11 - news paper ( in the second video as it blew off the log and i overlooked it )





here is some tinder / knife porn...

[cdreid]

This site needs a "you are Awesome" button..

[MichaelM]

This thread inspired me to use cattails to start a fire. There aren't any near my camp site, so I haven't ever actually done it before; I tend to use wood shavings, birch bark, and/or dry grass most of the time.

So I got my usual set up. There's a fallen pine tree nearby, so I added some fatwood as well. I got everything to where it's usually fine with a bird's nest of dry grass, but instead I used the head of a cattail.

The stuff flashes way too fast to light the kindling if you fluff it up. This stuff was a mix of tiny dry pine twigs and fatwood shavings, and it absolutely would not catch from fluffed up cattail head. The fluff went up just fine, but it burned far too quickly.

So I tried two things, and they both worked.

The first one was to fluff out a section of the cattail but leave it partially attached to the rest of the head. So it started to burn very easily with a ferro rod spark, and as it lit the fluff still attached sort of played out. Basically, as it was exposed to the heat from the fire, the compacted stuff fluffed out on its own. This kept the heat going for long enough to light the twigs.

The second time I did this, I threw a dry grass bird's nest on top of the pile of fluff. The fluff flashed up in one strike, lit the grass, and then went out. But by the time it went out the grass was burning just fine, and it burned for long enough to get the twigs going.

My conclusion from this is that cattails are a wonderful primary tinder, but you need a secondary tinder of some sort as well (even if you use the still-compacted cattail head itself as the secondary tinder).

[xxxDarksidexxx]

cattails have made me look like a fool on more than one ocassion. ive tried them a few times and every time i walk away a little frustrated. they seem to take a spark just fine, i get a flame, but then it quickly goes out... it doesnt even seem to want to smolder much for me.

[bluedog2]

Cool stuff on flint and steel firemaking and tinders. I think I'll give it a go.

I do find that a 9volt battery and wad of steel wool works as well or even better than tinder if damp

But I cheat and stocked up on flick lighters and grill lighters when they go on sale at the dollar store.

[Woods Walker]

cattails have made me look like a fool on more than one ocassion. ive tried them a few times and every time i walk away a little frustrated. they seem to take a spark just fine, i get a flame, but then it quickly goes out... it doesnt even seem to want to smolder much for me.

You need to flip it around and have a bunch of other tinder to catch the flames. Cattails aren't the top of my list either because of the fast flash over.

[Flying Lead]

I like the cotton wad things the Dentist uses to move you cheek away from your gums. Just add vaseline on one end and put in the tinder bag. When you take it out, simply pull one end apart and fluff it a bit. One spark from a fire steel will get the ball rolling. The dry end will flash up and get the vaseline burning quickly even at 20 degrees. It make work even colder, but I'm not going north to give it a shot.
They usually give me a handful when I go. Some $8.95 tinder kits actually use them.

[ninja-elbow]

I did a demo on making charcloth this weekend at Wintergeddon. Basic poke a hole in the Altoids tin, fill it with old cotton t-shirt patches or a rolled up strip of denim, put over coals and wait for the little flame to pop up - then go out. Let it cool = charcloth. No pics as people were either watching or still batoning or were doing lunch.

The main thing to reiterate, as it is the main question I get both here and IRL, is that char material is good to learn mainly for the fact it teaches you "the process" of making a fire. I do not advocate that people set themselves up to make charcloth in camp so they can lgiht a fire*. I advocate the 3 methods teaching plus one "surefire" (gas and flare?? ). Making char(anything) delves into the "sorcery" of firemaking, the fundamentals. If you understand the fundamentals, you can figure out more stuff than just learning a technique or 4.

Concept A + Concept B = Concept C
as opposed to
a+b=c
e+f=c
m+n=c

*The main questions is: "You have a fire already to make the charcloth, why do you need to make charcloth?"

[Woods Walker]

I did a demo on making charcloth this weekend at Wintergeddon. Basic poke a hole in the Altoids tin, fill it with old cotton t-shirt patches or a rolled up strip of denim, put over coals and wait for the little flame to pop up - then go out. Let it cool = charcloth. No pics as people were either watching or still batoning or were doing lunch.

The main thing to reiterate, as it is the main question I get both here and IRL, is that char material is good to learn mainly for the fact it teaches you "the process" of making a fire. I do not advocate that people set themselves up to make charcloth in camp so they can lgiht a fire*. I advocate the 3 methods teaching plus one "surefire" (gas and flare?? ). Making char(anything) delves into the "sorcery" of firemaking, the fundamentals. If you understand the fundamentals, you can figure out more stuff than just learning a technique or 4.

Concept A + Concept B = Concept C
as opposed to
a+b=c
e+f=c
m+n=c

*The main questions is: "You have a fire already to make the charcloth, why do you need to make charcloth?"

Yup there are some people who fail to start a fire even with a full kit but guessing those don't include someone who can blow a friction fire coal or charred tinder coal into flames then with that build a campfire. I totally agree that a person should have 3 proven ways to start a fire and tinder. They should also pratice firecraft.

As for the main question the only answers I could make up on the spot aka BS is the method that started the original fire was iffy and a person wanted every possible advantage/option available for the next fire. Or maybe just to add yet another tool inside their fire kit.

[Sojourner1104]

Woods Walker,
Very well put and a great presentation. Thank you for sharing. Though I have never been in a situation where I did not have matches or the matches I had would not work does not mean that it can not or will not happen. Here is a link that I feel is appropriate to the subject:
http://artofmanliness.com/2008/04/29/9- ... t-matches/

[Woods Walker]

Woods Walker,
Very well put and a great presentation. Thank you for sharing. Though I have never been in a situation where I did not have matches or the matches I had would not work does not mean that it can not or will not happen. Here is a link that I feel is appropriate to the subject:
http://artofmanliness.com/2008/04/29/9- ... t-matches/

I find it a bit funny that art-o-manliness doesn't know the difference between a flint and steel or firesteel. My guess it the author never used both or maybe any? In their defense this is a common failing. I think Bear did the same mistake in an episode of Man vs. Wild.

Welcome to ZS and thanks for the comments.