Magic Relighting Birthday Candles for Lighting Esbit Cubes

[Tony Wong]

https://www.amazon.com/Magic-Relighting-Birthday-Candles-Package/dp/B001MKOCG0/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1489090308&sr=8-1&keywords=trick+birthday+candles

I carry a mini bic lighter and found that I was burning my fingers and lots of precious lighter fuel to get my Esbit cubes to light.

Then a few years ago someone told me to carry one of those “trick” birthday candles that relight after you blow them out.

Quickly light the candle with your mini bic and use the candle to light the Esbit cube.

I found that holding my Esbit Cube with my left hand, I could put the candle under the Esbit Cube’s corner or bottom edge, I could get the cube to light up with a sustained flame from the candle easily.

The fact that it is a Relighting candle just makes it very wind resistant.

No burnt fingers from the mini bic lighter (heat coming off the flame so close to my fingers) and I conserved my lighter fuel, while the single trick candle weighs nothing and one candle has lasted me multiple trips.

Hope this helps….just passing along a bit of wisdom that has worked well for me for years.

Tony

[Roger Caffin]

Same package available on eBay for <$1 with free postage.
Such is life on eBay.
Cheers

[JCH]

Stupid question…how do you extinguish the candle such that it may be reused?

[Tony Wong]

JCH,

Actually, that is a good question.

It takes a little work.

When you blow out the candle the tip of the wick generally glows red hot like a tiny ember which you can blow on to re-ignite or it might re-ignite on its own.

You can blow the candle out and then snuff it out in the dirt.

You are just trying to kill that little ember on the tip of the wick so it can’t re-ignite.

Wipe off the grit and dust from the wick and you are good to go for the next time.

Alternatively, snuff it out in a little bit of water.

Tony

 

[Roger Caffin]

Pinch wick between your fingers. It might help to moisten your fingers first (to avoid burns), but there is very little thermal mass in the wick.
Cheers

[Tony Wong]

Roger,

I was never brave enough to try that method.

Call me chicken. ?

Tony

 

[Roger Caffin]

Ah – you blow the candle out first!
Cheers

[Ben H.]

Yup, that is the technique i use.  Lick my fingers, blow out the candle and the pinch the wick with my wet fingers.  You hear a little sizzle and the red ember is gone.

[Katherine .]

Yup, I carry a couple of those candles w/my emergency tinder.

[Erik G]

Or just take a full sized Bic lighter?

I wonder what the weight difference is between a mini-Bic + candle(s) and a full sized Bic.

[Gary Dunckel]

Or take a tiny dropper bottle of alcohol, squirt a few drops onto the Esbit tablet, light it with your Bic, and quickly get the windscreen positioned. I think that’s the easiest way to light an Esbit tab.

I played around with the trick candles myself. They can work. I cut them in half and cut away some wax on the bottom half to expose the wick. I then lit one and placed it in the groove of the Esbit, rather than lighting the bottom of the tab. I just let it burn itself out. It probably leaves a bit of paraffin residue on the pot, but no worse than what Esbit does. So one candle will essentially light two Esbit tabs. Not quite as efficient as what Tony wants to do, but it’s not a whole lot of extra weight to carry. I keep 4 of those shortened candles in my emergency kit to help light a 4 gm Esbit if I need to make a fire quickly.

[Tony Wong]

Gary,

Yeah, I have used hand sanitizer as an alcohol source for lighting esbit.

There is a alcohol gel used for lighting pellet stoves that works really well too.

I like the candle as I could use it for other pyro stuff too and wasn’t messy like a gel that also required another dropper bottle.

Why don’t they just make esbit cubes with a candle wick for easy lighting???

Tony

[Gary Dunckel]

Yeah, hand sanitizer (alcohol based) works too, especially if you mix it 50-50 with Everclear. It’s still a gel, though a bit more runny.

Now you are onto something big – an Esbit wick!  How about if you pre-drill small holes in the center of the Esbit tabs at home, sized perfectly to hold a short stub of one of those candles with a bit of its wick exposed. Patent that, and you’re done, Tony – you’ll be spending your summers chillin’ in the South of France & the winters in Acapulco.

But I want to know more about that “other pyro stuff.” You planning to wow the kids at the next campsite, or are you scheming bigger things? (Watch out, it looks like that little Wong kid is playing with matches again!)

[Tony Wong]

Gary,

The wick idea really came from Cameron from BPL….it really seems like a great idea for a solution to the pain in the butt task of getting the cube catch on fire.

As for my other pyro plans….easy, light a fire, clear a nice warm spot for my bivy by clear burning the ground….or a few acres of land, etc….LOL.

For safety reasons, I like to be able to light a fire easily in bad conditions…fire gel would help with that.

My go to is simply a firesteel with a cotton ball with vasaline….to get an extra long burn time, I have a small square of aluminium foil that I can use to shape a small fire bowl to create a small opening with the cottonball inside and achieve a burn that easily last for two or more minutes with a 2″ flame.

A tampon bullet made of cotton is a nice source of a lot of cotton in a tiny package too.

Fire good!

[Jason G]

nice idea tony

I bring along a 3cc (i think) mini dropper bottle filled with denatured alc. 1-2 drops down the side and a quick spark usually gets the fuel tab lit.

[Author]

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