# To Build A Fire



## luckylauren (Apr 3, 2016)

Call me lazy- but that is how we start our fires at home all winter.

You can also use a blaster (assuming you have one and enough propane).


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## cupido76 (May 22, 2009)

smhoeher said:


> Here I am at home, trying to cook some Gorgonzola cheese burgers for the family. Need to change the propane on the gas grill. The plastic gizmo breaks in my hand. No problem, I'll fire up the charcoal grill. The charcoal is "tired" and won't start. Add some Match Light but it's windy. Finally I get the propane torch from the garage, fire it up, and had flame in no time. The burgs were great!
> 
> 
> 
> It reminded me about a day on an early season, rainy, hypodermic, trip on the Yampa and the challenges of starting a drift wood fire. I'm ready to put the torch in my dry box. It ways nothing and doesn't take up much space. Another fire starting idea I've always thought of but never had in my kit was chunks of DuraFlame or something similar. Any other fire starting ideas or wisdom to share?


In addition to starting your fire easily, I've used a torch to carmelize the sugar layer on top of pre-made creme brulee. [emoji16]

Anything in your kit that serves more than one function deserves to stay there.


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## Electric-Mayhem (Jan 19, 2004)

One of the best additions to a kitchen box is a decent Bernzomatic Trigger start torch. It beats the heck out of the usual BBQ lighters that barely put out any flame and break all the time. Worth every penny of the $40-50 they cost. My group of boaters call it "The Match".

That said, my go to charcoal starter is a blaster or woodland power stove with a chimney. 1 minute on medium heat and you have all your coals lit. It accelerates the time to them being ready to cook with by a good 5 to 10 minutes.


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## Beer Waggin (Jul 8, 2016)

We always bring all our campfire wood... we might find a few pieces of drift and throw it on the fire. 
We use lighter fluid to start our river fires. Pretty easy with dry wood.
At home I use gelled alcohol... best stuff I know of. 

The young Boy Scout in the house stuffs dryer lint into empty toilet paper rolls. That works well too.


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## codycleve (Mar 26, 2012)

If you keep your woodland power stove legs folded up you can hold it and use it as a torch.. I have used mine as a weed burner.. the folded legs make a great handle.. 

Sent from my SM-G920V using Mountain Buzz mobile app


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## GOTY2011 (Mar 18, 2018)

I take a small bundle of Fatwood, it's available in a lot of places and even keeps the dry boxes smelling good.


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## griz (Sep 19, 2005)

Y’all don’t have your own dragon to start your fires?

Peasants.


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## Fly By Night (Oct 31, 2018)

You can get some basic plumbers soldering torches cheap that take up little space. If you use the 1# propane cylinders for your stove you are adding very little volume and weight to bring a torch to go on top. Torches are my favorite way to start a fire, they make getting kindling going quick and easy.


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## matt man (Dec 23, 2011)

Electric-Mayhem said:


> That said, my go to charcoal starter is a blaster or woodland power stove with a chimney. 1 minute on medium heat and you have all your coals lit. It accelerates the time to them being ready to cook with by a good 5 to 10 minutes.


Brilliant!

I like the propane or Map Gas ideas better than my old standby, Scout Water 
(lighter fluid).
I always carry a small amount of dry firewood in a rocket for getting fires going, usually smaller pieces of kiln dryed lumber, cedar works really well, smells nice to. Even if drift wood I find is real wet, I can pretty much always get it to dry and burn with a small fire of the “Emergency Firewood” stash. Getting a pile of charcoal going also works really well for this.


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## MontanaLaz (Feb 15, 2018)

https://www.rei.com/product/116342/snow-peak-gigapower-torch

These are a handy little accessory for your butane fuel canisters. We always carry the JetBoil anyway in case we quickly need to make a hot drink to warm a swimmer up.


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## MT4Runner (Apr 6, 2012)

Fly By Night said:


> You can get some basic plumbers soldering torches cheap that take up little space. If you use the 1# propane cylinders for your stove you are adding very little volume and weight to bring a torch to go on top. Torches are my favorite way to start a fire, they make getting kindling going quick and easy.


That's hard to argue against!


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## SERE Nate (Feb 1, 2019)

As a former Survival Instructor in the Air Force, I strongly recommend that you carry a small ziplock bag full of 100% natural cotton balls saturated in vaseline.

Its my favorite tinder to start a fire. It takes up little to no space, works when wet, easily accepts a spark (make sure that you aerate it well) burns for a long time, etc.

I always have a metal match with striker and cotton balls with vaseline with me when I'm out in the woods. You could totally be submerged, swim to the bank, and still have no problem at all getting your fire lit with this, and it fits into a small pocket on your pdf. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BF4WDVVDTp0


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## MontanaLaz (Feb 15, 2018)

Nice tip. Thanks


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## almortal (Jun 22, 2014)

My friend does something very similar to the cottonballs and vaseline. He collects dryer lint and puts it in the recycled cardboard egg cartons and drips either wax or softened petroleum jelly on them, and cuts it up into individual cups.


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## brwilzon (Mar 21, 2017)

I second the cotton ball and Vaseline strategy. I put mine in an old Tylenol container and carry as part of my first aid. Plus, you never know when you might desire some Vaseline.


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## SERE Nate (Feb 1, 2019)

almortal said:


> My friend does something very similar to the cottonballs and vaseline. He collects dryer lint and puts it in the recycled cardboard egg cartons and drips either wax or softened petroleum jelly on them, and cuts it up into individual cups.


That works as well, just not as compact, and dryer lint is a flash tinder, so it burns very quickly, even with the wax and cardboard. Much harder to light when wet in a true survival situation.

I've tried everything, even cheetos, and there's nothing better that cock and balls in vaseline.


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## athelake (Dec 3, 2014)

SERE Nate said:


> I've tried everything, even cheetos, and there's nothing better that cock and balls in vaseline.



Did you get the orange cheeto dust mixed in the vaseline!?


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## MontanaLaz (Feb 15, 2018)

athelake said:


> Did you get the orange cheeto dust mixed in the vaseline!?


:shock::lol:

Now that's funny!


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## smhoeher (Jun 14, 2015)

A lot of great ideas! After my BBQ dinner challenge last night I'm definitely putting my torch and a tank in my dry box and am going to add some of the Vaseline and cotton balls to the mix. If anyone gets a torch, get a torch that has the attached sparking button. I've heard that Fritos are great too but they're my absolute favorite junk food and I would eat them all. I better stick to Cheetos!


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## ColoradoDave (Jun 3, 2010)

Poof method. Charcoal starter ( Mineral Spirits ) OK to light with a lighter carefully.

I've used White or regular Gas also when backpacking. Just want to light something, then throw it in. Don't just try to light the gas with a lighter. Little too much poof.

Once the only way to get it going in high humidity and wind was to use White Gas on a wool sock. I couldn't even light a piece of printer paper that day. Just smoldered.


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## matt man (Dec 23, 2011)

Personally, I like to take a Bic straight to the white gas, adds excitement to my day, and, and it entertains me when people can’t tell what i’m really thinking, when they don’t have eyebrows to watch.


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## raymo (Aug 10, 2008)

*Use your pee(urine)*

I'm sure someone out there knows how to start a fire with common pee. I have done it and I know others have also. Geologists know this trick, that's how I learned it, he bet me 10$ and I lost.


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## Elvez (Mar 29, 2005)

One of my first kayak overnighters was a low-water trip to retrieve a kayak I'd lost a couple weeks earlier on an ill-fated high-water attempt.
I found the boat and bumped it slowly downstream. Dark came quicker than expected. We knew there was a hunting camp next to the river with a stack of dry firewood rounds under some trees, so we'd brought a splitting wedge and a hatchet, and a hurricane-proof butane lighter that someone gave me to try out. I had my sleeping bag in a drybag that leaked worse than my skirt, and my buddy swam at one point. 
At the camp, in the dark, we split wood like madmen, making an assembly line of processing whole 2' Doug Fir rounds into wedges and sticks and twigs and shavings, freezing wet in our neoprene and wool. I arranged a log-cabin-shaped bouquet of kindling and fuzz-sticks, and prepared a sequence of perfectly sized firewood in a wind-protective wall. Robert Baden-Powell would have wept. 
Then I clicked the button on the lighter and it made an electric spark, but no flame. Quick shake: no fluid; RBP rolling over in his grave.
I had a backpacking stove and fuel, but the burner was so soaked only a few of the little burner holes let gas through. Had to push the piezo-electric lighter trigger up against a single burner hole with the stove gas running. Finally got one hole to light. Then three. Three little blue jets of flame dictated our immediate future. Plan B was to paddle out in the dark.
But then the heat from the three little flames started breaking the surface tension of the water plugging the adjacent holes, and soon we had enough flame from the stove to get our campfire started. We nursed tiny kindling flames for a minute before we got it choochin' on its own, then threw the Bushmills cap into the coals, dumped endless logs on a roaring fire and danced around like we'd invented it.


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## BilloutWest (Jan 25, 2013)

matt man said:


> Personally, I like to take a Bic straight to the white gas, adds excitement to my day, and, and it entertains me when people can’t tell what i’m really thinking, when they don’t have eyebrows to watch.


The military mosquito repellant ( 99.9% Deet) doubles as a blow torch.

Alaska firefighters all know this practical fact.


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## k2andcannoli (Feb 28, 2012)

I thought every river trip had at least three butane torches on board. Hash aint only a breakfast food.


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## raymo (Aug 10, 2008)

*Calcium carbide.*



raymo said:


> I'm sure someone out there knows how to start a fire with common pee. I have done it and I know others have also. Geologists know this trick, that's how I learned it, he bet me 10$ and I lost.


Calcium carbide rocks reacts with pee, water, snow to create acetylene gas, a spark ignites the gas to create a very hot flame.


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## matt man (Dec 23, 2011)

In the immortal words of George Washington Hayduke, “CHEMICALS!”.


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