Up in Smoke: Backcountry Fire Building Videocast

Thanks for the video, but how can you not like Air Supply??

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2HejVjzhKTY

>>I chose to showcase some of the best commercially available fire starters in the video. I also happen to choose to sell some of the best commercially available fire starters in the BPL store. It's no coincidence that there was overlap in this video ; )

Fair enough. Maybe I'm just grumpy today.

I am not aware that BPL sells egg carton fire starters or waterproof matches. I thought the video was fair and balanced, and I did not have any impression of it being an infomercial.

I would like to see a followup done in the rain, and with more use of natural tinders.

I have occasionally used part of an Esbit tablet to sustain a flame long enough to dry materials so that they will burn. Once you get a few small sticks involved it can make enough heat to dry larger stuff.

Enjoyed the video, Sam. The build-up techniques and wet demonstration you mentioned would make a worthy part 2.

Another future direction I'd like to see would be how to actually cook on such a fire. People who know how to do this will laugh at me, but I've never actually seen someone cook over a backcountry wood fire. Of course, I'm mostly interested in light or UL style.

How do you prepare the fire? Do you need to make coals? How to get those quickly? How do you boil water without ruining the pot or burning your hands getting it out? How do you roast the fish another camper gave you, if you don't have all those wire baskets on long handles?

Go ahead everyone, laugh.

Hey Sam, I'm interested in those bic lighters you showcased, how do I go about accquiring those. I've heard great things.

Gary, Bic lighters can be procured at just about any Air Supply concert ; )

Mini Bics +1!

"People who know how to do this will laugh at me, but I've never actually seen someone cook over a backcountry wood fire."

The people who truly know how to do this won't be laughing at you, Kerry. Nobody has ever been born with a Tinderkwik in one hand and a striker in the other. We all had to learn by a combination of trial and error, and/or asking those with experience. There is a fair amount of info already posted here on your questions, but I don't think it is organized into one thread. You might try using the BPL search engine and, if you don't find satisfactory answers, just start a thread and you'll get plenty of opinions, answers, recipes, etc. Then you can start experimenting and see what works for you. In time, you'll develop your own set of methods and materials, part you and part what you have learned from others. Everyone does. Have fun and don't ever be afraid to ask a question here. This is a very supportive bunch of folks.

Did someone say they need some lint?

Alright this is embarrassing but here it goes.

Lint collecting for 2.5 years with me and my 3 roommates that has collected in the corner of my basement. There is a paper bag full… and a little overflow.

Whats the price per pound on this stuff? lol

"Lint collecting for 2.5 years with me and my 3 roommates that has collected in the corner of my basement. There is a paper bag full… and a little overflow."

All that from 4 guys' navels? Awesome!!

Most disgusting fire hazard – ever.

"Most disgusting fire hazard – ever."

wow…didn't think about it like that. Although its in the corner with nothing around it should be ok but I'm gonna go clean it up now.

Maybe I will save it up in something and then make a quilt out of it next year

I got this lighter app for my iphone, I figured it would work the same. I'm just curious, how do I start a fire with it?

Nice video. I never use fire starter in the wilderness so it was a good introduction for me. Normally I just grab a couple squares of toilet paper (unused) and that's enough to start small twigs.

The bit about the dryer lint was cool. I'm going to try that sometime. The egg carton/lint/wax creations looked a bit bulky and time consuming to make (for a lazy person like me).

It appears that the 'Sparkie' requires a firm surface to use. It's cool that it's one handed but a regular flint & steel seems like a better choice since you can throw sparks where ever you want (ie. into a tinder pile).

In the North East there is whats called "tinder fungus" its fairly easy to find. It will take a little practice to figure out how to get it to take a spark – (try crushing it into fine powder or slicing paper thin pieces ect.)

More info here:
http://www.wildwoodsurvival.com/survival/fire/tinder/tinderfungus/true.html

The advantage of this is that it will smolder and hold a coal for a while giving you time to try and get some kindling to flame up.
Every environment will have some different material suitable for tinder just read up on what was traditionally used in your area.

"People who know how to do this will laugh at me, but I've never actually seen someone cook over a backcountry wood fire. Of course, I'm mostly interested in light or UL style."

I second that this is no silly question. Whole books could be written on the subject. I have built small fires and racked out half the coals when they formed and set my mug on them so that the mug was on the coals and next to the flame. You can continue to feed the flame and make more coals as the water starts to boil. Thats what I did anyway. I have a ti tri cone now.

Sam,
Yeah, how about a similar video, but under challenging conditions (wind, rain)? That might help showcase some of the other helpful tips.

Good video.

Tom

It took me a couple weekends to finally shoot this video. I took two backcountry trips in which I planned to get footage for this but both trips I ended up pushing darkness upon arrival at camp and didn't have light to shoot.

The video I did produce was shot on a car camping trip (note I'm wearing sandals) at a beautiful location near Hyalite Resevoir in the Gallatin National Forest.

I'd like to do another one that focused on the use of all natural tinders and fuels using only a fire striker. Also, I'd like to present techniques for fire starting in wind, rain, and snowy conditions.

All that being said I'll probably have to bring a video camera on a half dozen trips in order to get the footage I want. It's a worthy topic and I'll see what I can do.

Nice, Sam!

I appreciate the instuctional articles, reviews, and videos!

Keep 'em coming, BPL!

Todd

Good job! Been saving dryer lint, but have not yet used it. Like your technique with the fire steel. Will try it soon.

Please give us more videocasts.

as mentioned earlier- Old Man's Hair, Witches Hair, Bear Hair (and I'm sure lots of other local names)- family of tree lichens, makes a wonderful tinder (if dry)

you can also add a little fir sap to it for extra oomph :)

many of the birch family barks are also a good bet for natural tinder

iirc survivor man in one episode used a corn chip as tinder! :D

I am glad to see the format and application… thanks!

One of my pet peeves about emergency firestarters is the need for redundancy inherent in some of the methods. Example? Using a sparklite tinder to ignite the wax/lint firestarter in the video. If I really need to get a fire going, I don't want a "product" (including homemade) that needs a strong open flame to get it burning. I've also found that hexamine tabs and such don't light as easily. Through lots of "experimentation," (ie, playing) I've found that petroleum jelly-soaked cotton balls offer the best combination in ease of catching a spark, ease of ignition, and steady, hot, wind-resistant flame. If you have petro/cotton balls, you don't need to carry any other kind of tinder whatsoever. I carry them double-wrapped in foil so that I can wrap a bit around them to enhance the burn time.

Simplicity…

Cheers-

Basically, in damp locations, it may be necessary to bring in dry tinder. Leather bags are popular for tinder as they breathe. The first survival book I read recommended collecting dry tinder whenever you see it in case you need it days later. After a series of damp days even air dried birch – the dead twigs caught in branches – can be challenging to light. Or so I thought till an expert showed me the secret. He filled the bottom third of my Bushcooker with dry bog cotton from his leather bag, invited me to put a spark on it and then added dead heather flowers. We had flames two feet high within twenty seconds. After a start like that, the Bushcooker will burn just about anything. My mistake had been meanness with the tinder.

Obviously, you need to think before bringing in dead plant material from another place. Petroleum jelly-soaked products definitely have a place in my pack.

I'm assuming that this is a sequel to my demonstration from our Packrafting trip: "How to Start a Fire in Only 3 Hours Using Nothing But 16 Swedish Firesteels and An Acre of Dry Brush".

– Ben H.

Maybe I'm a bit slow on the uptake. What's the purpose of the wax in the egg carton method?

Also, I followed the link about the fungi in the Northeast. Did I read it correctly that the False Tinder kind burns as well as the True Tinder kind? If so, somebody could have come up with a better name… :-)

Here's the link I followed:
http://www.wildwoodsurvival.com/survival/fire/tinder/tinderfungus/true.html

Thanks in advance!