[Dillinger]

So, I finally got some good color of black on the piece of 100% cotton T-Shirt that I had placed in the tin.

Here you can see the one I "made" with a piece of the same shirt that I plan on using for the real fire time check in the next few days ( I hope ).

[Dillinger]

Hell yeah, I got this. I am going to nail Francisco's first challenge and take the early lead over Benning.

Hello Mr. Murphy!!

Because the hounds' interest in what I was up too, and the fact that my backyard looks like the perfect condition to start a very large fire, I moved to the front of the house on the driveway. Brought a pitcher of water, just in case, grabbed some dry grass and went about trying to get some spark off my knife.

[dunerunner]

You have sun?? Rained all day here!

[Dillinger]

I tried about 6 rocks from my yard of many. One I broke with the back of my Eastwing axe to get a nice "fresh" piece of rock to strike against the knife.

I was working up quite a sweat trying to get a spark and I did get about 3 or 4 really small ones. I have a slight breeze that blows in off the lake across the way, it will hardly blow your hair into your eyes, but damn if it wasn't enough to make my little fire plans look like climbing Everest in a man-thong.

So, by now I am sweating pretty good, the dogs are going ape shi*ite because they are inside and dad is outside and I am wondering "Would I be dying right now? The guys are going to LOVE this."

I finally get some very small sparks onto the charcloth and I am giving it a very subtle encouragement and for about 3 seconds, I thought I had finally succeeded.

Yeah, not so much.

Making fire with my knife and a rock with my charcloth beat me like a rug. I was down, I was damn near out and I know I wasted WAY too many calories if I had actually been out in the woods and traveling. I can only assume that my rock choice sucked and my charcloth, while black, was not done "enough" to have that "instant burst to life" fire making ability.

Well, do I just give up? Eff that, I am sweaty, I have been working for an hour and even though it's 68 degrees, I want a damn fire... LOL

So, I go to my BOB and get my Blast Match, which is basically a rod of magnesium that you strip off with a knife and get sparks.

Yeah, it fired RIGHT UP. There are no pictures of the fire, because quite frankly, I had to cheat to get it done.

But, here is what my knife looks like after trying like hell to get a spark with inferior PNW rocks and some charcloth that wasn't ideal. Oh, and after playing with my Blastmatch.

Master Chief Francisco, I humbly accept my "F" on this assignment and wish to try again before the next evolution.

JD

[Angry_bald_guy]

Ok, the knife I got sent from SG is stainless. Will this cause a problem with me creating a fire? I haven't tried yet because there aren't many rocks around me so I need to go looking.

[amoroque]

1) Last night I started out with a camel Snus can and 5 cotton gun cleaning patches.
2) I placed all 5 patches in the tin and poked a hole in the lid.
3) I put the tin on the burner on my BBQ pit and waited about 10 minutes.
4) While the cotton was "cooking" I went to the laundry room and found a ball of dryer lint out of the trash can.
5) The cotton was blackened and ready to go.

[amoroque]

6) I took one piece of charcloth out of the container and put it on the floor in the garage. I was then able to shower some sparks on it using my knife and a flint firestarter.
7) I then placed the charcloth on top of the dryer lint that I had already put in a beer can that I cut in half.
8) I blew on the sparks to increase oxygen and start the dryer lint on fire. The sparks were starting to go out, so I poked a few holes in the sides of the can.
9) The lint went up and I had fire

[Troy Michalik]

OK, so yesterday I searched and searched for an old Altoids tin I just KNEW I had. Frustration set in and I resigned to pick one up from the store today.
Then a thought fluttered to the front of my mind. I remember a small alcohol stove I made a few years ago for a backpacking trip my son and I took. I think this may be a good tin for making charcloth. So we are making tools, for making tools, for starting a fire.

Here’s how:
You’ll need two aluminum soda or beer cans. Cut the bottom inch and a half or two inches off of each can. Since my knife hasn’t arrived yet, I used the next closest thing I had which was a razor blade.

[Troy Michalik]

You’ll need to make the cuts as straight and neat as possible, so use a block or flat rock as a guide as shown. Turn the can against the blade to scribe all the way around the can.

[Troy Michalik]

After two or three times around, the scribe mark should be deep enough that you can pop the bottom of the can off.