EDC: Lighter

Make fire to cook, light in the darkness, heat in the cold you just must have fire. While I have previously discussed the heated lawnmower blades as a fire lighter, for many they are not easy to use, especially when so many simple alternatives are available. Certainly the pair of iron strikers will last much longer off grid, often fire is needed fast and easy not eventually. Lets look at some commonly available cigarette lighters and their features, pros and cons.

Typical low pressure disposable plastic lighter

Disposable plastic type lighter.

Fuel : pressurized butane

Refillable: usually no, sometimes yes check for valve.

Fuel life span: depends on use

Ignition system: usually striker wheel and flint, sometimes piezoelectric

Ignition life span: striker wheel good, piezos can often fail

Material: Mostly plastic

Weight:  low

Cost: low $1-2

Main advantage: cheap readily available.

Main disadvantage: not refillable usually

Typical high pressure piezoelectric butane lighter. Some have an LED light as a optional feature.

High pressure butane type lighter

Fuel: butane at high pressure

Refillable: Sometimes

Fuel life span: Fuel often will leak, 2 weeks at most.

Ignition system: piezoelectric.

Ignition life span: often fails before fuel is gone.

Material: plastic.

Weight: low.

Cost: medium, often gimmick factor in price.

Main advantage: very hot flame, good in windy conditions.

Main disadvantage: very unreliable.

Typical Zippo type lighter. Iconic.

Zippo type lighter

Fuel:  volatile liquid hydrocarbons

Refillable: yes

Fuel life span: 2-3 weeks depending on fuel, temperature, and use.

Ignition system: striker wheel and flint

Ignition life span: long 3- 6 months between replacing flints

Material: metal, brass  is common

Weight: heavy

Cost: high $30- 50 depending on brand and quality

Main advantages: very robust, big flame, very simple design.

Main disadvantages: heavy, difficult to replace flints, fuel will evaporate quickly.

Typical Imco type lighter. One of the better options.

Imco Triplex type lighter

Fuel:  volatile liquid hydrocarbons

Refillable: yes

Fuel life span: long

Ignition system: striker wheel and flint

Ignition life span: medium, uses flints fast.

Material: metal

Weight: medium, not much heavier than plastic lighters

Cost: medium, $20

Main advantage:  small and easy to maintain, quite reliable creates large spark, long fuel life

Main disadvantage: uses flints fast, seem complex at first, lots of sliding parts and a spring.

Conclusions:

If you already have a Zippo type or Imco type lighter, keep it. If you can justify $20 or more for a lighter, get one of those two, if not, two or three low pressure lighters. Avoid the high pressure lighters, their special feature is seldom needed and they fail often. If you are deciding on a liquid hydrocarbon fueled lighter remember to have fuel and periodically check the fuel levels.

Paint can rocketstove: field test

Rocket stove made from a paint can and 3 smaller 300 gram food cans. Small rocks used to create gap between pot and stove

This rocket stove was was constructed out of a 5 Liter ( 1.32 US  gallons ) paint can and 3  x 300gram  ( 10 ounce) food cans. The grey paint was not fully removed from the can and some is still visible. I would recommend that if a paint can was used the paint is completely removed with an appropriate solvent, turpentine or water depending on the type of paint base. If a solvent is not available the can can be heated in an open fire to burn out the remaining paint.

Boil time for 1 liter of water approximately 10 minutes.

dry wood ash was used as insulation.

Some small rocks were use to create the pot stand.

The paint can handle was left on to create an easy way to move the stove.

Addition of the fuel shelf helped the stove produce better air flow an prevents over filling with wood fuel, the shelf was held securely in place with a small rock.

close up of paint can rocket stove fuel shelf. Small rock holding shelf in place, some holes in shelf for better air flow.

Soil stove

If found this looking through old documents.

A stove made from a mix of sand, soil sand an dung slowly piled up in the corner of a house. I think anthill sand is coarse sand, soil being loamy soil, and dung having fibre binder like mud daub houses.

All natural products, no metal or money required. Get primative but use your head, this likely to  work only in hotter/ drier regions. Uses less fuel and produces less smoke.

3 week construction time.

A stove for free made from soil, sand and some cattle dung with straight stem branches for moulds.

Scram bag : Potasuim permanganate ( KMnO4 )

Potassium permanganate crystals.

A very useful substance.

Also called Condy’s crystals and Permanganate of potash.

Can be used to:

Light fires.

Add to a flammable substance that is a liquid, glycerine, oil,fat, a little water will help the fire start.

Sterilize water.

3 crystals per liter of water will sterilize the water.

Disinfectant for some skin infections.

A stronger solution will make a solution that will attack fungal and bacterial infections.

Keep in a well sealed container

Keep away from eyes

If contact is made with skin wash it off with water, brown stains (MnO2) on the skin are common, but will disappear in a few days without further incident.

can be purchased from pharmacies and often found in survival kits.

Rocketstove: Making one from metal Olive oil container

For the last few months I have have comments turned off. There was a lot to say and I didn’t want distraction. But don’t think that meant I wasn’t listening to you. I pay attention to what people read and what search terms lead them here.

Rocket stoves have been a popular search item so its time to give you even more information.

I’m going to make one. I’m starting with a 13kg Olive oil can and I’ll have photos for all the relevant steps and a boil time test.

13 Kg olive oil can.  31 pounds in weight

The starting material a large Olive oil can. restaurants and other food businesses throw these away quite regularly, so that’s a good place to start looking if you don’t usually buy oil in this size container.

It’s convenient that there is a large round hole in the center of the top so I wont need to cut one there. Somewhere in the purple band is where I will cut a hole for the pipe which will be the elbow bend pipe.

There is a small handle on the front which i will probably keep as it will be useful for carrying the stove if I need to move it. i think the handle will be better at the front rather than the back as it will stop the ashes falling out for the bottom of the elbow.

 

The next step will be using sand paper to remove the paint from the can. If the paint is left on the can, it will burn and produce unpleasant and possibly toxic fumes.

 

<more to come>

Scrambag: folding pruning saw

Apart from the obvious intended use of pruning trees, the compact folding pruning saw allows you to collect small branches easily.

A saw is safer to use that a axe or heavy knife in cutting wood. One of the most common sources of dry wood in a forest is dead-fall.

Dead-fall is dead or broken branches fallen to the ground, and are often very dry and difficult to cut will axes as the will act like a spring when hit.

Sometimes dead-fall is a branch upside down and very dry, because of this it makes excellent fire wood or construction material.

The saw can elegantly cut of the exact pieces you want and even help you create items form the wood with precise cut lengths and flat ends of wood.

The saw is also very light compared to a small axe and very small, about the size of a small axe handle.

Folding pruning saw, compact and allows straight cuts in wood with little effort.

 

Price about $10 for average quality.

Available from hardware stores and gardening supply stores.

Fire: Swedish fire torch

This is a really neat technique of conserving wood and getting a fire going fast and making a stable cooking platform. You will need an axe and a saw to shape the wood block, but it looks worth it.

I just had another thought, all the things are familiar but arranged in a different way and its suddenly so much better, what a concept.

Scram bag : Aluminium can stove

Aluminium can stove photograph

Firstly I know my North American readers will say you spelled it wrong, and while you may be right in that in your area its spelled aluminum. But  according to IUPAC its been officially Aluminium for the last 15 or so years.

We are of course talking about the 13th element on the periodic table witch has low density and low corrosion rate due to its propensity to form a protective oxide layer.

Aluminium will however corrode markedly if it is left in a salty environment such as a salt spray zone near an ocean or salty lake.

I should talk more extensively about Aluminium as a material at a later date.

We live in a throw away society where things are made to be used once and then destined to become land fill. The humble aluminium can is one such product.

However we can change the game and turn a low cost one use item into something much more useful and possibly life saving depending on the situation.

Water is of course essential for life, 3 days without water and its likely that you will be dead, close to dead, or if miraculously resuced at the last minute you may suffer from life long health effects.

Water is a great mobilizer of materials and living things some of these living things will be very harmful if you drink them.

If you find water of unknown quality you will need to be cautious.

Straining water even with a cotton shirt will remove most suspended material (dirt etc) but will not kill pathogens.

Boiling water after it has been strained will kill most pathogens and make water much safer to drink.

It not appropriate  or possible to make a fire in ever possible location you might be so a small cooker is a great option to have.

You could buy a propane/butane gas cooker but they are expensive by comparison require large gas canisters and are in themselves somewhat bulky and fragile.

So there is a niche for a cheap to make cheap to run cooker for boiling water or cooking food.

I made an awesome info-graphic and I’ll add it here. it may be better to download the image or open it is a separate window to see it in its full glory.

It described the manufacture of one of many designs of the aluminium can stove.

pic

Aluminium can stove info graphic

Manufacture notes

1-Remove all of the paint from the can with sandpaper.

2-Empty the can.

3-Put holes into top section. (thumb tack or drill)

4-Cut out the circular section around the ring pull. (razor blade)

5-Cut into 3 sections. (razor blade or tin snips)

6-Cut center section.(razor blade or tin snips)

7-Flange out the  sharp edge bottom section slightly. (screwdriver shaft)

8-(optional) add glass wool between bottom and center sections.

9-Put top section inside bottom section.

Fuel

this stove runs best from pure alcohol.
Pure alcohol is quite hard to obtain. the pureset from of alcohol is methylated spirts.
methylated spirts is about 96-99% Alcohol.
the rest (1 -4%) is made up other impurities (like methanol) so that is is toxic and/or unplesant to drink.
Methlyated spirits is quite cheap at about $2-3 per litre making this a very economical fuel.

Use
pour fuel into the center section of the stove and light.
it may be easier to light the stove with a  match or piece of paper or dry grass rather than a lighter.

during day time the flame may be difficult to see.
once light the stove cannot be easily extinguised and the flame heat is not adjustable.
Different sotves produce different ammounts of heat and this may be a way of controlling heat.
multiple stoves may be used together to produce more heat.

Why is this item important.
It shows that useful things can be made from commonly available low cost items.
It introduces people to making things for themselves.
In many situations the ability to boil water to sterilise it maybe a life saving device.

The material
Aluminium does not readily corrode except for in a very salty environment.
(such as in the salt spray zone of beaches)
Aluminium may begin to corrode when place in contact with other metals for extended periods of time.
Aluminium melts at 660C, so its unlikely to melt during normal operation.
the thickness of Aluminium in cans makes them quite fragile.
A  sturdy container is recomended to prevent the stove being crushed in a backpack.

Alternative designs
there are many alternative designs to the can stove.
Each have their merits in terms of use and ease of construction.
For some people constructing these is a serious hobby.

precautions

Resources: wood ash

An important concept is life is to recognize resources and know what uses they can be put to.

There is not waste resource, just a wasted resource opportunity.

So what is in wood ash?

Wood ash makes up 0.34 to 1.8 percent of the weight of dry wood burnt in its production.

So 10kg of wood burnt will produce at least  34 grams of dry wood ash.

Wood ash is a good thermal insulator if it is kept dry, the small air pockets in it allow for it to have this insulating property, once it becomes damp or wet these air spaces collapse and do not return upon drying.

Wood ash is:

about 25-45 % Calcium Carbonate ( CaCO3)

About 10 % potash (K2CO3, KCl , K2SO4)

about 1% Phosphates (PO4¯³)

The temperature  and duration of the fire will influence the composition of the wood ash.

For example ta higher temperature will reduce the Calcium carbonate to Calcium oxide and make any resultant Lye more alkaline.

Wood ash is also used in odor control in composting especially if it has a high char content.

By adding water to Wood ash, Lye is produced, an alkaline mixture of Calcium and potassium hydroxides, thought the calcium salts will precipitate as it is not very soluble in alkaline solutions.

Lye is commonly use to reduce acidity in soils

Lye is also used in making  Soap

Lye can also be use to clean clothes directly by in doing so you are relying on the oil in the clothes being turned to soap during the washing process.

So it will be a lot slower and you will have to heat your water.

Scram bag: Char cloth tin

Char cloth is one of the easier was to turn a spark into an ember, which of course can be turned into a flame.

To make the char cloth you will need a char cloth tin.

A great source of char cloth tins are empty nugget tins, though other well sealing tins can be used.

Kiwi boot polish tin.

Make char cloth tin:

1) Remove all paint from the tin with sand paper. (otherwise it will stink as it is heated)

2) Make a small vent hole 2-3 mm diameter (perhaps with a nail) in the top of the tin.

Use of char cloth tin:

1) Add small pieces of cut up natural cloth (20 mm square) into the tin and close it. (wood or paper can also be used)

2) Place tin on the embers of a fire with the vent  hole facing up.

3) Wait for smoke to come from the tin, and wait for the smoke to stop.

4) Turn the tin over so the vent hole faces down. ( this allows both sides of the cloth to char properly)

5)Wait for smoke to come from the tin, and wait for the smoke to stop.

6) Remove tin from the embers and allow to cool.

7) Open to inspect the char cloth.

Char cloth quality tests:

If  it is brown it need to be cooked longer.

If it is crumbly too the touch  it was cooked too long and must be discarded.

It should be black and soft but not too fragile.

Store the char cloth in an air tight container. A small piece of tape or bees wax over the vent hole may be enough.

Char cloth use:

Place char cloth in your fire starting kindling nest and place char cloth in the center.

Using what ever method you have of creating a spark, attempt to create sparks on the char cloth.

The cloth will smolder with red orange ember lines flowing through the material. blow on it gently in the kindling nest and flames should take hold.

Fun facts about kiwi boot polish:

Invented in Melbourne, Australia by Scottish immigrants, Made in Indonesia, and now owned in USA.

The US army just calls it Kiwi, just like they call the fruit a Kiwi.

Connection to new Zealand? One of the inventors wives was from New Zealand.

Allegedly this boot polish cemented the Kiwi as a symbol of New Zealand.

http://www.enotes.com/topic/Shoe_polish

Cost: free* ( Some assembly required.) or possibly free with nugget for your boots.