I've been having a play today with friction fires.
Struggled with the bow drill owing to my drill not being straight or long enough
, so a little foraging is on the cards for tomorrow!
However, I'd had a long length of dry elder in the shed for ages, about half inch diameter and about 2 foot long. I'd not considered it before because it's mainly pith, only a tiny amount of wood. I gave it a try anyway.
First tried it on a piece of cedar that was given to me. The cedar was too soft.
I then tried it on a piece of ash. Surprisingly I had smoke almost instantly, and within less than a minute I had an ember
This was repeated again with beech with the same result. Less than a minute to a smoking ember.
Third time in a row on the ash, and my arms were starting to feel it, ending in smoke but no ember.
Being hollow, the elder only made contact with the hearth board on the outer edge leaving a ring. I don't know if this helped the process, or whether my technique is out of this world.... I'm leaning toward the former on this.
touched by nature
Struggled with the bow drill owing to my drill not being straight or long enough
, so a little foraging is on the cards for tomorrow!However, I'd had a long length of dry elder in the shed for ages, about half inch diameter and about 2 foot long. I'd not considered it before because it's mainly pith, only a tiny amount of wood. I gave it a try anyway.
First tried it on a piece of cedar that was given to me. The cedar was too soft.
I then tried it on a piece of ash. Surprisingly I had smoke almost instantly, and within less than a minute I had an ember
This was repeated again with beech with the same result. Less than a minute to a smoking ember.
Third time in a row on the ash, and my arms were starting to feel it, ending in smoke but no ember.
Being hollow, the elder only made contact with the hearth board on the outer edge leaving a ring. I don't know if this helped the process, or whether my technique is out of this world.... I'm leaning toward the former on this.
touched by nature
