FIRE! Denver survival co-op Sun Oct 24th

[Wulf202]

Topic: Firestarting

Location: Paramount park gazebo/bbq 27th and Kipling west side of the park. Street parking.

Time: Sunday oct 24th 9am sharp-10:45

Gear required: 1 Open mind, tinder, dress for the elements

Optional gear: Lawn chair, note book, your fire starting kit, a small portable grill

Cost: $0 (donations are accepted)

Breaking out the trusty wax coated matches, life boat matches, ferro rods, lighters, flint and steel, magnesium blocks, fire piston, magnifying lenses, etc to light the fire.

Demo of basic tinders like PJ cotton balls, dryer lint, milkweed down, char cloth, etc

If you've got some peice of kit you want to show bring it, I just organize the event. Anyone is welcome to present. If you have a topic you can lead or want to learn more about, drop me a line.

If you want to RSVP you can email me at wulf202 at hotmail dot com

Next date november 28th topic BOB bags show and tell.

[Irving]

Going to put this one on the calender and try to make it. Thanks for hosting these.

[Wulf202]

November meeting moved to the 14th due to the holidays. Topic is still BOB bags

December topic cutting tools and sharpening date is the 5th or 12th depending on the guest speakers' schedule.

Jan. 2011 schedule unknown until I found out about work.

The water class may make a second appearance before the end of the year due to a special request.

[Irving]

Bump again.

Wulf, do you have confirmed people coming from Arfcom?

[Wulf202]

no RSVP's but either way I'll be there and anyone is welcome. I'm going to snag a birds nest i've found for some practice getting a blaze going from real world materials. Collected some dryer lint.

I'll have enough char cloth for anyone to try out.

I grabbed some milk weed down to play with.

I'll have several tools to play with, just finished my fire piston.

I'm 6'4" so I'll be hard to miss in a vacant park. Plus there's only one BBQ...

[Irving]

Okay. And this isn't Crown Hill right? But the one across the street?

I've got one of those Light My Fire flint things where you scrape sparks off the rod. I've also got a pill bottle full of petroleum coated cotton balls. It is insanely easy to start a fire with petroleum cotton balls I've discovered. I look forward to seeing that other stuff that you are bringing.

[Wulf202]

yup the park just across kipling from crown hill next to the sinclair.

pj cotton balls are great. if you bring some alum foil ill show you how to make a candle out of them and quadrouple the burn time

[Irving]

Sweet, I'll do that. I was going to make another hobo stove out of beer cans again. I lost my last one. I'll stuff it with cotton balls and see if I can pick up some fuel. I guess I could piece another one together but not seal it, in case anyone else shows up that doesn't know how to make them.

[gnihcraes]

Will try to make this one.

December cutting tools will be interesting. I have three fresh stitches from a knife accident yesterday. DOH! Still not sure what happened, but I was bleeding well. Very sharp knife! ha [ROFL2]
[Rant1]

[Wulf202]

see you there. ill bring the burn gel...

[Irving]

Just need to shower and hop in the car.

[StagLefty]

Just need to shower and hop in the car.

Please stop long enough to get dressed-your dealing with fire starting and wouldn't want embers to fall in your lap [ROFL3]

[glock21]

damn wish my wife didnt have to work this morning, i would have went damn early morning shifts

[Irving]

Even though the police showed up to shut us down, we were still there for over 2 hours and the whole shebang was a great success.

Thank you very much for doing this Wulf02.

[StagLefty]

What the heck were you doing that the police showed up ?

[Irving]

"Playing with matches," as one of the officers so condescendingly suggested.

[gnihcraes]

Interesting too, I didn't see any rules or regulations that that park? PD was cool about it.

At home, I tried the PJ and 0000 steel wool, it worked ok, but not like PJ and Cotton balls. I put together about 10 pill containers will PJ Balls and have stashed those in each car and backpack. Even had the kids playing with the magnesium(sp) spark tool, they finally got it down.

[Wulf202]

Apparently there was a fire ban in all of jefferson county, which included the bbq at the park in the city of lakewood.

A parks worker gave us permission to do it, then called the cops later. We didn't get to test out too many methods before we were shut down. After that it was a verbal class with examples of methods.

:SIGH:

Atleast we had a good turn out and good discussion on the topic.

[Irving]

Thanks again Wulf.

I tried that PJ candle at home, and I couldn't keep the "wick" lit for more than a few seconds. I'll have to play around with it because it is a great idea. After a few tries, I just opened up the whole thing and set the whole cotton ball on fire and it burned for nearly 5 minutes. In fact, I lit that chunk of fire bar you lent me (thanks) with the PJ ball as well. It was interesting to see the PJ ball of about the same size as the fuel bar chunk burn for at least twice as long. I also played with the char cloth a little as well. then I fell asleep for 3 hours.

[glock21]

how do the pj cotton balls work? do i just smear the pj on them and light it, or does it have to sit awhile, im intrested in trying the tonight

[Irving]

Just open your petroleum jelly, toss a cotton ball in there, and cram it into the jelly until the whole thing is covered. You don't need to wait or anything like that. The idea is that you pull out your PJ covered ball and pull it apart enough to expose some of the dry cotton (better for lighting). Then you just light it.

They actually work so well, that after you're done playing with them and seeing how they work, I suggest just pulling off a portion of the ball and saving the rest. PJ on cotton burns long enough that just a small piece is usually plenty to light your tinder box and start a full fire.

[glock21]

ok brb going to try, i hope baby pj works hahahah, ima try my magnesium blok on it

[glock21]

ok im back. That works awsome, i even had my wife and daughter in awe hahahahaim definetly adding that to my survival bag and both vehicles

[Irving]

Glad to hear it. It took me some experimenting, and after I got comfortable with it, I can't see not having it.

[glock21]

yea i lit up fast with just a spark.

[Wulf202]

http://imgur.com/eGvaW.jpgMy collection of fire starting/kindling stuff at the park.

Well the meeting started off with an example of char cloth being used to hold an ember to start fires, showing off the split pea lighter from county comm, we used some fire gel, showed off mischmetal and Stuart's fire steel, then used a safe and sane flashing firework which is great for signaling and starting wet fires. I showed of a great example of what happens when you coat the matches in too much paraffin. Screen name gnihcraes brought out some OOOO steel wool

Just as we were using some wood shavings the Lakewood PD showed up to tell us that the county had a ban on any exposed fires due to a rural fire a month ago. In the ban even the city bbq grills were subject to it. After some skepticism from the officers we were allowed to proceed as long as nothing else was lit. We will skip the part about the city parks worker who told us it was ok, then called these officers to tell us it wasn't...

We continued to verbally and with poorly drawn pictures on napkins explain different techniques from hand/bow drills and fire plows to carrying cigarette lighters.

http://imgur.com/toxfA.jpg
estibit stove; a staple of backpackers, the stove folds up to slightly larger than a deck of cards and can hold 4 cubes inside and acts as it's own pot holder. The down sides are the fuel tabs aren't cheap and stink, the stove itself can tear holes in a bag.

Alcohol can stoves; brought by Stuart (no pics sorry)they are great and inexpensive ways to make a cheap stove, and can apparently burn white gas well! Downside is they need a seperate pot holder and are a bit fragile. A possible solution is the kiwi stove http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vuXmT7hcQw4

Char cloth; holds an ember well, however it is messy and needs a previous fire to prepare it.

http://imgur.com/Jpm0N.jpg
Fire steels; throw sparks well and catch tinder nicely. They do require some level of practice to be able to throw sparks reliably where you want them. Holding the striker correctly is a big part of it. The pictured one is from goinggear.com and has a larger pill bottle as a handle.

Fire piston: Once constructed you can have an ember just about anywhere. Requires special tools and technique in place. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-djD2n2YSv0

http://imgur.com/hnjOO.jpg
Fire works; I carry these flashing magnisum fireworks as signals and fire starting. They are so bright you may not be able to look at them directly, and have the hazards of carrying fireworks.

http://imgur.com/O3AIO.jpg
split pea lighter with a photon knock off for comparison w/Zippo spare fuel container. This combo is great and small but not light weight. It will give you hours of usage and hundreds if not thousands of fires started. The Zippo container has some short comings, the spare flint carrier is junk. The jump ring, a split ring that attaches the cap to the key ring, is a major weak point and should be replaced before carrying.

http://imgur.com/knCbq.jpg
Matches: carry in a sturdy container, they're bulky for one time use and highly subject to moisture.

Magnisium blocks: Good solid flames even with wet tinder. They take time to prepare the shavings and are easily bumped or blown around accidentally. Also you may have to use a knife when its cold or dark adding to the risk factor.

Cigarette lighters: The fastest and easiest way to carry fire in your pocket. Being built of plastic one person shared the story of bumping into a tree and breaking theirs inside the pack. The cricket lighter, pictured, has a child safety on the gas button and is nearly impossible to depress accidentally in your gear and loosing all the gas. The cricket is also refillable and holds it's gas well, the one pictured has been in my BOB bag for 5 years and is still half full.

http://imgur.com/zAM77.jpg
Gel or liquid fuels; instant fire with just a spark. The fire gel can be had in ketchup sized packets on the net. The down fall of alcohol based flames is they're barely visible and can cause severe burns.

http://imgur.com/RVabD.jpg
Petroleum jelly and cotton balls; another staple of BOB bags, I suggest using bag balm for more uses than just fire starting. It works great as a mild antiseptic and a lube for fire pistons along with it's burning capabilities.

It was fun, I wish we'd have been able to do more but I think we did well with what happened.

There's a bunch I'm leaving out, I'm trying to include more pics so let me know what you think. It's late and I'm rambling.

[oscar615]

Wulf202, Do you have a website or online group/calendar? If so what is the address? How do people typically keep tabs on what is happening with your meet ups??

[Wulf202]

We have a calendar at http://www.coloradopersonalsecurity.com/schedule.html but it's still in progress.

I post the co-ops on co-ar15.com ar15.com getoffthex.com and I'm working on zombiesquad.