Flint & steel

[Timelord]

Spent a few hours today making up a nice flint & steel set. Used an old quality flat file. Sheffield steel stamped on it. Tested a few against a piece of flint until a good sparking one was chosen. Ground most of the rough file surface off except on the striking face. Thinned the width. Annealed it. Reheated & forged it bent double around my vice handle. This leaves enough space for the fingers. Deburred it. reannealed it. Differential tempered it in cold water. the striking face was tempered at blue heat for hardness and the handle part was tempered softer. Made a mini forge expedient oven out of a Lyles syrup tin that was lying around in the workshop. Propped lying on its side, this retained & localised the flame so the workpiece was heated to red heat evenly.
Was going to cut the file tang off but decided to leave it on & turn it into a spike/flat awl. Filed the tang to profile. Annealed & tempered it to deep purple - the same as chisels. This was tricky & took 3 attempts due to the narrow tapering shape/mass.
Split a flint cobble. Selected a suitable angled piece & tried out the result. Excellent!

Will post photo of this at same time as water purifier photys