Effective, waterproof, recycled fire starter

[ATCclears]

How to: Make effective, waterproof recycled firestarter - YouTube

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[AMProducts]

While not "free" the cotton balls coated in vasoline is probably a little easier to manage, they're all of uniform size, also cheap. I suppose if you needed something that would put up with more heat without making a mess you could use paraffin instead of vasoline.

 

[U201491]

We always keep a big bag of pitchwood with us in the truck and in storage.
A small chunk starts even when wet and burns hot.

 

[AMProducts]

Pitchwood is fantastic, but it can be hard to find, I remember I discovered it quite by accident and it was like I had thrown a few gallons of diesel onto our nice quiet campfire.

 

[CoastRange57]

I have made my own with a combination of shavings, cotton balls, parafin wax, in egg cartons. They work well, but I like the cotton strips and jeans thing for simplicity. In my GHB I keep a small tin of lighter fluid as well. Get that fire going, hose it down with that and you are cooking.

 

[U201491]

Pitchwood is fantastic, but it can be hard to find, I remember I discovered it quite by accident and it was like I had thrown a few gallons of diesel onto our nice quiet campfire.

Yep, only takes a small piece to start a fire, burns hot and pretty much smokeless. It lights even when wet.

 

[Sgt Nambu]

That u tube was way to much trouble! Sawdust, egg carton (paper not foam), string wick and soak it all in wax! Burns long and hot! Little smoke. Just tear off an egg cup and light it. I'm actually using some my mom made pushing thirty years ago!

 

[cookie]

Road flares are a good way to start an emergency fire. Have a few road flares in the bag.

 

[Stepside2000]

We use the vaseline on cotton balls too and it works great. We also use road flares when we go camping if there is a chance of rain as they will definitely dry out wet wood if ya get your fire stacked right. We also keep a package of these small "signal/emergency" flares by Orion that come in a two pack in the camping section at walmart in my ghb and our camping trunk. They are about 3-4" long so they are perfect for packing in a bag.

 

[Koda]

Take the lint from the dryer and put it in zip lock bags. Super ultra light for backpacking or whatever, you can compress a ton of the stuff in one bag.

 

[erudne]

There is a lot of fat wood localy, I also scrape the sap off of ponderosa pine trees onto a piece of bark as a starter.

 

[Blue Devil PA]

Magnesium shavings on vaseline impregnated cotton balls.

 

[Brutus57]

My dad showed me a trick that works if you are in second growth find an old cedar stump, and chop in to until you get to dry wood. We were on an elk hunt and I was about 13. Cold, wet snow and blowing but we got the fire going and had the best toasted ham and cheese sammiches ever.

Brutus out.

 

[ATCclears]

Magnesium shavings on vaseline impregnated cotton balls.

Torch!