My all time favourite isn't here, a condom full of petrol smothered in vaseline, wire wool and a car battery.
A very old friend of mine (in both senses of the word) used to love running Scout Campfires, he must have know every song going and a few that nobody else had ever heard of, but his speciality was the way he started the fire.
When the audince arrived he told them that the wood was too wet to burn and that the camp fire was over, unless they could warm it up by cheering it. Of course the did, louder and louder until POOF! It burst into flames.
The secret was that the fire was built hollow, and in that was a fistful or wire wool and a length of old mains cable with a couple of large crocodile clips on each end. You may not have seen this but when you pass enough current through wire wool it catches fire, which was the plan.
At a pre-arranged signal (he would scratch his head) his assistant (sometimes me) who was hiding some distance away behind a bush would wait until the next loud cheer, connect the battery and the wire wool caught fire.
This was all well and good but sometimes it wouldn't catch so you started you teased the wire wool through vaseline which burns like crazy, but to make double sure you put a condom full of petrol under the wire. As soon as there was a flame the condom burst and the flame fell into a pool of petrol, making a very satisfactory woof and the fire would start as if by magic. The crowd were always taken back and suprised, it worked so well, right up until Milenium Camp, May 2000.
This was a huge fire, for 600 people, so it was bigger than normal plus it had been raining so we decided that we needed more than one condom. Officially I think it was 3, but my brother maintains it was nearer 10.
The run up was the same as always, many people knew what was coming and looked foward to the start, and boy there were not dissapointed.
All I can remeber was seeing my friend standing in front of the fire and WHHHOOOOMMPPFFF, suddenly he was shiloutted in a light so bright and hot that for a second you couldn't see him. Bits of wood flew up in the air and spiralled down everywhere. Kids screamed, leaders screamed, I screamed and then every body cheered not realising it had gone wrong!!
We had three quick songs and went back to our tents as it was so wet. Later that night we noticed the back of his anorak had melted.
He carried on with the trick right up until his death a few years back, but after that he used a bag of rabbit hay instead of petrol, which was slower but still worked and got an "Ohh" rather than a "what the
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