First time lighting a fire with a striker

[craig]

I made a striker a few days ago out of some cultivator shovel steel, spent some time practicing striking on small bits of quartz I found...then last night I made some charcloth out of old jeans and fired up my wood stove with it. I was pretty happy when the glow and smoke burst into flame !!
The striker is nothing fancy, a small curl for the handle...just basically did it to test the steel. It was water quenched.

[Arbalist]

Nice job Craig, that looks good!

Vic.

[Marksnagel]

Looks good! Something else to add to my list of things to make. I have some old files that should work nicely.

Thanks for posting.
Mark<><

[pkrankow]

Doesn't need to be fancy. You made it, it works well, so it will be special to you. Looks like a nice basic design. Strikers that work nice are a treat to use, and that is better than being fancy.

Phil

[aquamanlr]

Nice job, I keep one in my hiking bag. It is also in a tin with char cloth and some flint.

LeeRoy

[Frosty]

Looks good to me too. I've found a little plain old broken charcoal works in place of char cloth. The pieces just need to be large enough they don't blow off when you blow on it.

Frosty the Lucky.

[craig]

Thanks for the comments !!
It was fun and I plan on making more.

Looks good to me too. I've found a little plain old broken charcoal works in place of char cloth. The pieces just need to be large enough they don't blow off when you blow on it.

Frosty the Lucky.

I tried catching sparks with a few different things the day I made it because I didn't have charcloth...I wasn't able to get it to work. I was getting sparks, though I can't say whether or not I was getting lot's since I've never used one before... And I actually did try with a piece of charcoal too with no luck...but maybe now I'll have to try it again.

I've read that dried fungus will also work...anybody know of anything else ?

[pkrankow]

I've read that dried fungus will also work...anybody know of anything else ?

The fluff inside cat tails is supposed to...never tried with a striker, but with a match it works. You get about a basketball sized puff from one cat tail at the correct time of year. That time is late summer into fall, winter, and even possibly early spring when the fluff is coming apart with the seeds.

At the wrong time of year for fire making, but I am unsure the right time for eating, it is supposed to be sorta like corn on the cob, yes, edible...never tried it, not for lack of cat tail. I have half a 1/3 acre pond of *JUST* cattail. The root is a tuber and also edible, supposed to be like potato, and present year round, haven't tried that either.

Phil

[craig]

The fluff inside cat tails is supposed to...never tried with a striker, but with a match it works. You get about a basketball sized puff from one cat tail at the correct time of year. That time is late summer into fall, winter, and even possibly early spring when the fluff is coming apart with the seeds.

At the wrong time of year for fire making, but I am unsure the right time for eating, it is supposed to be sorta like corn on the cob, yes, edible...never tried it, not for lack of cat tail. I have half a 1/3 acre pond of *JUST* cattail. The root is a tuber and also edible, supposed to be like potato, and present year round, haven't tried that either.

Phil

Cool, I have some cattails too I'll have to remember that for next year...as for eating, supposedly you can grind them up into a flour as well. I'm pretty sure I read that in the SAS survival handbook. I'll have to re-read it.

[aquamanlr]

If a person whats to try cattail tubers, you might think about what is up stream. Anything that is in the water shed above you is also in the sedament that the cattail is growing in.
Be sure of your suroundings.

LeeRoy

[craig]

If a person whats to try cattail tubers, you might think about what is up stream. Anything that is in the water shed above you is also in the sedament that the cattail is growing in.
Be sure of your suroundings.

LeeRoy

True enough...but whatever is in my cattails is probably (to some extent) also in my well water so for the amount of them I'll eat, if any, shouldn't be too bad.
I just wanted to start fires anyways :P

[Frosty]

Using charcoal instead of char cloth is easy enough but you need to have a bird's nest tinder ball to do it reasonably easily. cat tail fluff, corn silk, dry rotten log punk, most any tree or plant fluff like cottonwood, willow, or fireweed fluff. If none is available I've beaten dry sticks or bark to fuzz between rocks. Grinding dry leaves and grass between your hands makes decent tinder too though what kind of leaf or grass can make a difference.

Once you have a decent tinder ball, prepare the fire bed and line out your fire building sticks, wood, etc. Smallest first of course, etc. Make a ball from your tinder with a hollowish center like a donut with a bottom. Place your charcoal, cloth, fuzz, etc. in the tinder blocking the far side of the hole. Strike your sparks and blow gently, the tinder will help hold charcoal powder and tiny chips but you can blow it all right through the tinder so blow gently.

Another issue is what kind of sparks your striker is making. I've found bright orange to be the longest lasting and fattest so they get the fire going sooner. White sparkler are hotter but they tend to spread out and cool quickly. Red sparks tend to be fatter but aren't as hot as orange.

Adjusting spark characteristics is done by tempering or not bringing the stock to full hardness in the first place. Different steels will need to be adjusted for so unless you're familiar with the alloy make one, harden it and give it a try. Some steel is too low carbon to make decent strikers. I've found garage door springs, allen wrenches and hex bar work nicely for me.

Frosty the Lucky.