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  • Hey Guest, Early bird pricing on the Summer Moot (29th July - 10th August) available until April 6th, we'd love you to come. PLEASE CLICK HERE to early bird price and get more information.
  1. Jeff Wagner

    Fire Bow Challenge

    I wish to propose a friendly competition - all in good fun of course and in the interest of expanded bushcraft skills. Tone - I hope there is nothing objectionable in this. I will grant a new $100 custom fire piston to the fire maker who can product a coal in the fewest number of bow...
  2. Jeff Wagner

    Deceptive appearances

    Things are sometimes not as they appear. For example in the photo below one might assume at first glance that they might be a collection of writing instruments..... [/IMG] When in fact the item at the top is actual a covert firearm.... and the item in the center is actually a fire piston -...
  3. Jeff Wagner

    Gasketless Fire Piston

    Something new for your amusement. It has no gasket nor sealing device - simply a bare shaft. It lights charcloth and tinder fungus quite well. Have not yet experimented with the more challenging tinders. http://s132.photobucket.com/albums/q35/FirePiston/?action=view&current=Scout.flv?t=1166439474
  4. Jeff Wagner

    Wet ember

    For your amusement and entertainment, I have uploaded a short clip showing the ignition of a fire piston immediately after retrieving it from being submerged in a glass of water. I did this last summer to illustrate the harsh condition capability of the device...
  5. Jeff Wagner

    Fire from wood punk

    I did the unassisted ( meaning, no blowing involved ) fire from punk today. The coal was lit from punk using a fire piston and then tranferred to larger pieces of punk. The amount of punk used was about two handsfull. While it took 11 minutes for the smoldering pile to finally burst into flame...
  6. Jeff Wagner

    Three Pole Cook Set

    While preparing for our kayak camping trip last month, the thought occured to me that I would like to take along my iron tripod for use in cooking over the fire. The second thought was ..."its too large and too heavy". The third thought was..."why not take just the chain and hook and cut some...
  7. Jeff Wagner

    Kayak Camping

    With summer rapidly waning I have been trying to get out as much as possible while the good weather lasts. So far, we managed to get in some sailing time on Lake Ontario, Camping in Stony Brook and Allegany State Parks and this past week was a combined kayak and primitive camp outing...
  8. Jeff Wagner

    Natural tinders for flint and steel

    For your reading entertainment. Jeff Wagner Wilderness Solutions www.wildersol.com Natural Tinders for Flint and Steel The use of charcloth in primitive fire starting represents something of a chicken and egg conundrum. In order to make charcloth, one first needs fire… and to make...
  9. Jeff Wagner

    Fire steel discovery

    I will admit that to date I have been a bit less than excited about firesteels. My method for lighting was to scrape along the full length of the rod with a knife or back edge of a saw blade, etc. pulling the ferocerium rod while holding the knife stationary. While this produces a great shower...
  10. Jeff Wagner

    Bow drill enhancement

    I have stumbled across something concerning bow drill spindles that seems very interesting. I have never heard of this before and have not yet tried it to confirm, but on an intellectual level it seems to make perfect sense. The premise is, the working end of your spindle starts out flat and...
  11. Jeff Wagner

    New hand drill clip

    The new hand drill clip came in at a little over 2 MB so I loaded it up on the webpage. While interesting, I think drilling into tinder fungus does not display as well as a wooden hearth board in a video clip because you cant see what is going on inside the hole. This time the coal formed in the...
  12. Jeff Wagner

    Hand Drill Kits

    Rich - What are the woods in your hand drill kits?
  13. Jeff Wagner

    Sometimes less is more....

    Mullein spindle hand drill, tinder fungus...12 seconds. It took longer to put this out, than it did to form.
  14. Jeff Wagner

    Fungus tutorial

    Many weeks ago someone, perhaps Patrick , posted an excellent tutorial on the steps involved in the preparation of fomes fomentarius into amadou. Where do I find that now?
  15. Jeff Wagner

    Hand drill

    All this discussion on the hand drill ( nice job Richard, by the way) has my juices flowing. I would like to post a video clip to show that it can be accomplished in a far shorter time - like perhaps 30 seconds. Suggestions on how or where to make this available for viewing would be appreciated.
  16. Jeff Wagner

    Fire Piston Demo

    For the benefit of those who have wondered how a proper fire piston should perform.... http://tribaltrades.com/fire_piston_demo.html
  17. Jeff Wagner

    Fire steel and....stone

    So you've gone out to play with your new fire steel and discovered that you neglected to bring the metal scraper thing along. Now what...? Try it with a sharp piece of stone or broken glass.... ;)
  18. Jeff Wagner

    Tinder tips

    While the fire piston can ignite a variety of natural tinders, not all of these are convenient to handle. For example, it is quite possible to ignite rotten wood punk. ( This can somtimes be a challenging tinder to use as it is more stubborn and usually requires 2 - 3 attempts before lighting...
  19. Jeff Wagner

    Embassy Help

    What a mess. I am stuck here in London for the weekend while we attemp to straighten out a problem with my girl friend's US visa. Free fire piston to anyone able to assist. Please PM me.
  20. Jeff Wagner

    Secrets of the hand drill - revealed

    Would anyone be interested in learning how to make fire by hand drill using materials from your local lumber supply? I recall that JC has already mastered the hand drill with a native Australian spindle. You may be very surprised to find how easy this method can be when using the right...