Forum Challenge...1 Month...FIRE!!!

[Mortblanc]

I suppose I have to be the exception here, since my journey has been very diverse. I belong to clubs that have fire making contests on a regular basis as part of what we refer too as a "woods walk" competition, which usually incorporates about a dozen primitive skills.

I do own fire steels I have made myself. Forged by my hands in the blacksmith shop.

I also use char-punk I made with no manufactured assistance, as well as char-cloth.

I have also sparked fires from the spine of my Openil knife onto a frayed strip torn from my cotton shirt.

I have a nicely crafted fire drill I use for demonstrations, made from materials I gathered myself. I had a student get a flame from that set in less than 30 seconds on one occasion.

I have also started fires with the fire plow, which can be done easily with only a knife.

But, the only real way one would wind up in the situation stated in the OP is if one fell naked from an airplane in the middle of the Amazon rain forest.

We must also remember that Neanderthal grew up with HIS state of technology, just as we do ours. He practiced these skills from birth and we are saying "go out and do them immediately, with no training".

And we do have evidence that the cave men used pyrites to spark fires! It was not all elbow grease and praying to the spirits.

My preps include normally having two or three methods of fire making available at all times. I have a ferro rod on my keychain, another tapped to a survival card in my wallet and lighters and magnesium bars scattered through the vehicles and the kits they contain, plus all the built-in fire making accessories the vehicle naturally contains.

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Picture #1 is my fire bow set

#2 is a fancy and plain steel I forged

#3 is a "giveaway kit" I make up for students. A chip of flint, a piece of broken file with the edge ground smooth, some char cloth and frayed rope fibers. The pen knife is 3" long as a size comparison. This is in a candy tin but I sometimes use old shoe polish containers or whatever is at hand.

The nice thing about a metal container is you can use it to produce your char.

#4 is a picture of char punk (No it is not charcoal). It is much less fragile than char cloth, burns longer and is available in nature.