# How to Cheat Starting a Primative Camp Fire



## SeniorSitizen

If hiking / camping and would need a camp fire through necessity for survival, or if a camp fire was planned, take along in you back pack a few pieces of wax paper. It's light weight and much safer to transport than most flammable liquids. I've found it to rate right up there with kerosene on the flammable scale. And no, I haven't attempted to ignite it with flint but if I can get caught up in my busy retirement schedule I may try that.


EDIT: Spel chk doesn't do titles. Lazy bunch.


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## Windows on Wash

Good idea. I will have to try that.


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## Mystriss

We have fire starter rod things in all the cars for emergencies. Weather proof, water proof, small and portable. I suppose I'll throw in a few squares of wax paper for if we can't find anything dry. Up here we can typically break off some spruce branches and they dry out real fast, burn fast and hot too so it's typically pretty easy to get some birch going.


(Did you know that pines can grow all year long? Like leafy trees basically hibernate the freeze, pines just push the water in and they use the small amounts of heat given off by water freezing, around 3 degrees F, to keep other internal water from freezing and rupturing their cell walls. Nature is awesome!)


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## Bud9051

A friend is also a forester and explained to me that what I was calling "pine needles" were actually leaves. I still call them pine needles.

Anyway I have watched many demonstrations on how to start a fire in emergency situations and although it can be done it isn't as easy as rubbing 2 sticks together as the old solution suggests. I'm running out of years but have long planned to try a few of the methods. The real trick is to find some dry material.

For now, some modern accessories are much easier, usually a lighter.

Bud


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## SeniorSitizen

We don't have any native pines but we just returned from a Christmas vacation where they were plentiful. And yes, those pine leaves/needles:biggrin2:are wonderful fire starters when dry. I'm thinking it would be nearly equal to gasoline if some crumpled wax paper was topped with dry pine pine needles with some air space. I do know I quickly learned not to light the paper up toward the top because if I do I better be prepared to move my ole hand very quickly if using a pocket Bic.


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## SeniorSitizen

That was probably spruce branches I used in AK long time ago to cover snow in the tent. It makes a good bed to put a doubled pair of mummy style sleeping bags on when -40°F. They insulated well enough no snow melt after nearly a week but a lot of things were different on permafrost.


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## Oso954

A few Fritos and a bic lighter makes a wonderful fire starting combination.


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## chandler48

Primitive?? No Bic, no Fritos, No wax paper. User Ferrocerium bars and scrape the magnesium off it, and strike it with a rod. Stable in storage. More than Fritos, anyway


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## SeniorSitizen

I'll never forget the scouting contest to determine which troop could start a fire with flint and make a gallon of water boil first. The winning troop found some creosote wood in the area. Of course it was contested but the judges let it stand. Now talk about cheating!!!!:vs_laugh:


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## SeniorSitizen

Oso954 said:


> A few Fritos and a bic lighter makes a wonderful fire starting combination.


By the time I arrived at the camp site the Frito bag was always empty.


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## chandler48

> Frito bag was always empty


Then you could use the bag to start your fire ....with a Bic.


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## Nik333

Oso954 said:


> A few Fritos and a bic lighter makes a wonderful fire starting combination.



You always seem to know the why. . . so what's in Fritos & why did you try this?


BTW, guys, a Bic lighter is FIRE. Cheaters.


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## Mystriss

Bic lighters don't work so well when wet or frozen. Ferrocerium is the ones we leave in the cars for emergencies. We have box like ones somewhere in the house for emergencies as well.


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## Nealtw

steel wool and a 9 volt battery. 
https://www.instructables.com/id/How-to-make-fire-using-only-a-battery-and-steel-wo/


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## lenaitch

Nik333 said:


> You always seem to know the why. . . so what's in Fritos & why did you try this?
> 
> 
> BTW, guys, a Bic lighter is FIRE. Cheaters.



Fritos, Doritos, potato chips are all dried vegetable matter soaked in oil. Low moisture content + oil. The vegetable base is glucose plus elements such as potassium, magnesium, etc. Apparently most all food is flammable but most have too high a moisture content. How well they start and burn will depend on the product. Apparently ripple potato chips start but don't maintain a burn as well.


There used to be a TV show called Survivorman who tried it and it worked quite well. He also tried cotton balls he had soaked in petroleum jelly and stored in a waterproof match tube and they worked well. I think on that episode he started it with a battery (simulated aircraft crash).


Ferro sticks are great. So are flares if keep them in your car.


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## mx13

lenaitch said:


> Low moisture content + oil. The vegetable base is glucose


Just to pick nits, the base is a mixture of starch and cellulose (mostly starch, I think, since Fritos are not exactly considered to be a high-fiber food). Those are both polymers of glucose, but chemically they are not "glucose," any more than muscle is MSG, even though it contains glutamate. Among other distinctions, glucose dissolves readily in water, starch and cellulose do not.

Admittedly, they should all burn about the same...



> He also tried cotton balls he had soaked in petroleum jelly and stored in a waterproof match tube and they worked well.


In the old days, I liked to use 35 mm film cans to store dryer lint dampened with kerosene or rubbing alcohol as a fire starter. Alcohol probably would have dried off too much over time to be much use in the long run. Sadly, those film cans are pretty much unknown now. I guess a ziplock snack bag would work about as well, though, if not submerged too much, since they often leak just a little.

I'll bet petroleum jelly works best if used very sparingly. I'm guessing that you want to rub the cotton with a little petroleum jelly so it's greasy but still somewhat fluffy with plenty of surface area to let air get into it, not globbed together like you'd want for fiberglass soaked in resin, for example. 

Now I want to experiment with playing with the cotton to vaseline ratio and use this to light my Weber grill!


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## HotRodx10

I've used the dryer lint, not soaked in anything. I also prefer a micro torch, like one of these to a regular lighter.


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## Steve Driscoll

Put a carbon knife, a ferro rod, and some dryer lint smeared with vaseline in a zip lock baggie in your kit. Blast matches work too.


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## Nik333

I like the challenge of starting a fire with damp wood. I haven't failed, yet.😄


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## Bud9051

Damp wood is certainly a challenge. What is your method?

Bud


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## Nik333

Bud9051 said:


> Damp wood is certainly a challenge. What is your method?
> 
> Bud


Using kindling & straw-like vegetation if available.. I just keep trying. It works.
You'd have to become a Girl Scout to know.😄


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## Bud9051

Do you use a bow, plow or a hand drill? Or do you rely on something you brought along to create a spark?
As for being a Girl Scout I was one for several years when volunteering at Camp Natarswi in northern Maine. All parents had to be registered as Girl Scouts to be covered under their insurance.

Bud


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## Steve Driscoll

Bud9051 said:


> Damp wood is certainly a challenge. What is your method?
> 
> Bud


For when things are soaked, a can of Sterno will fit in your kit.


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## Nik333

Bud9051 said:


> Do you use a bow, plow or a hand drill? Or do you rely on something you brought along to create a spark?


No. Just elbow grease and a match. We always seem to have pine needles in California.

( I often wonder if people reading this from say Bangladesh understand our colloquialisms)


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## Nut'n'Done

Nik333 said:


> Using kindling & straw-like vegetation if available.. I just keep trying. It works.
> You'd have to become a Girl Scout to know.😄


Us Cubs would get the Girl Scouts over to our camp. 
Get the sparks flying, then, poof... we were on fire


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## sestivers

mx13 said:


> In the old days, I liked to use 35 mm film cans to store dryer lint dampened with kerosene or rubbing alcohol as a fire starter. Alcohol probably would have dried off too much over time to be much use in the long run. Sadly, those film cans are pretty much unknown now. I guess a ziplock snack bag would work about as well, though, if not submerged too much, since they often leak just a little.


What about used prescription bottles, are they waterproof (the orange-tinted clear plastic with white caps)? They are about the same size. I use them for quarters for the parking meters but that does not require me to test how waterproof they are 🤷‍♂️


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