Firesteel Challenge?

[Martyn]

Just a bit of fun really, but with perhaps important things to be learned.

Following a humerous, if slightly bizzarre thread on britishblades, I was wondersing exactly what kind and diversity of materials you can use to get sparks from a ferrocium rod.

It is (or hopefully "was") a popular myth that you had to use carbon steel to get sparks, now everyone should know that stainless works too. But what else? In theory at least, anything harder than ferrocium, with a sharp edge to bite into it, should do the trick.

Why is this useful to know? Well imagine you are out somewhere and get caught short without a knife (god forbid) but you do have your trusty ferro rod? What are you going to do? Fire by friction? With no knife to make the hearth etc? Or look for alternate ways to get sparks off your ferro rod? A list of things that work, would be useful - no?

Anyway, the theory is, not only can you use any steel (stailess or carbon), it doesnt even have to be metal. Take your ferro rod, open your back door and scrape the rod on the corner of your house - tell me what happens? I havent tried it, but I'd be interested to know if broken glass (bottle) works. I have tried a brass screw, that worked, but not brilliantly. A copper plate didnt work (too soft I think).

So, go for it - how inventive can you be?

I'll start a list and edit it for each new discovery. Remember, the edge of the material you use has to be sharp, sharply squared or rough for it to stand any chance.

1. Any knife with a sharp ground spine. (excellent)
2. Brass screws. (mediocre)
3. Real flint. (excellent)
4. Broken Glass (good)
5. House Bricks (excellent)
6. Broken glazed pottery. (good)
7. Sandpaper. (variable, depending on grit)
8. Anodized, knurled maglite body. (very poor)
9. Cobalt reamer. (excellent +++)
10. Tungsten carbide burnisher. (excellent +++)
11. Titanium alloy ring. (excellent)
12. Slate. (good)
13. Granite. (good)
14. Iron pyrite. (good)
15. ?

Key to comments with relevance to igniting dry cotton wool tinder...

excellent: First choice as a striker
good: Very competant alternative
mediocre: Will work with some effort
poor: You'll be lucky
very poor: Use petrol as a tinder.

 

[ditchfield]

Real flint works brilliantly. Broken glass also works well.

Good idea this. :-D

 

[Martyn]

Excellent.

Doesnt surprise me about the real flint - if you can use it to get sparks out of carbon steel, you should have no problem with a ferro rod.

I can confirm the corner of my house works very well indeed, so we can add housebricks to the list.

 

[Martyn]

We can add broken glazed pottery to the list too. Works very well. Not surprising as glaze is similar to glass when it's been fired. Surprisingly, sandpaper didn't work - though maybe I wasn't using a coarse enough grade.

I'd be interested to know what natural materials people can find on their travels, what kind of stone? I bet granite works well, gritstone too, dunno about sandstone. Broken pebbles?

What about animal materials? Bone? horn? teeth?

 

[Adi007]

An angle grinder works!!! :bu:

 

[Stew]

Surprisingly, sandpaper didn't work - though maybe I wasn't using a coarse enough grade.

I managed to get this to work with a medium grit sandpaper. You get more of a "flash" though so you would need to hold the tinder alongside the sandpaper (Like the technique of holding the tinder with the knife)

Bone? horn?

Personally, I've found both to be too soft. :-(

 

[MartiniDave]

The spine of my frosts "training knife" doesn't work very well, nor does thew spine ofmy otherwise superb Helle Eggen.

Hacksaw blade works well, as long as you remove the paint first.

I will try other things over the weekend and report back!

Dave

 

[Martyn]

Thanks, this is great. Remeber (especially with regard to knife spines), it must be sharp, or sharply squared off. If the spine is rounded, it doesnt matter how hard the steel is, it wont spark your ferro rod. Many knife spines have a slight rounding to them, few have a harsh, square edge. The performance of nearly every knife can be dramatically improved by grinding or filing a harsh, square edge onto the spine. I'm not recommending this, just pointing it out. :-D

I'm not sub-categorizing different knives, because any steel hard enough for use as a knife, with a sharp enough spine *will* throw a spark off a ferro rod. If your knife wont spark, it's not the material, it's the design (prove me wrong? ).

Interesting about the rough sandpaper, I'll add it to the list, but comment it as "mediocre". I wonder if the sandpaper on a swan vestas matchbox works?

I just tried the body of a maglite and I did get a spark, very poor, small flash though. This surprised me, I thought "wow, aluminium works" so tried it on a piece of raw aluminium stock - it failed miserably, it was just too soft, no matter how sharp, it just deformed and wouldn't spark (conclusion: aluminium is softer than ferrocium). I then realised it must be the hard anodized coating of the maglite which made it work. So I tried a surefire, which has Type III hard anodizing (harder than the maglite), it worked better than the maglite, but still very poor. You'd need charcloth or possibly petrol or something to get a fire going. :-D

 

[Martyn]

An angle grinder works!!! :bu:

LOL, last I looked, an angle grinder got sparks from concrete.

 

[Stew]

Interesting about the rough sandpaper, I'll add it to the list, but comment it as "mediocre".

Actually Martyn, I don't think I would bother putting it down, or maybe as poor. I thought I should actually go try lighting something with it as surely that's what we're interestd in.

I couldn't even manage to light cotton wool using sandpaper, no matter how I tried it. In fact, the more I did it, the less it "flashed" even if I used fresh sandpaper. I think that it needs to have edges to rub off, rather than the smooth ferro rod that I've now got!

 

[Martyn]

Well, if it works at all, then it must be harder than ferro, so I'll leave it in. But will change the comment to very poor.

 

[Martyn]

Oh.... My..... Goodness.... I just tried a Cobalt reamer and good grief!!! :shock: :yikes: :shock: the sparks, oh the sparks...

This is probably the hardest material I can access, combine that with the aggressive & acute edge of a reamer, and whoosh, half me firesteel gone in one strike. I nearly set fire to the floorboards.

I think Cobalt is harder than tungsten/titanium, but it would be intereting to compare.

 

[boaty]

Neither of the two laminated blades by Trond I have access to spark very effectively - the firesteel deforms the (shaprish) edge on the blade's spine

My Felleskap throws pretty good sparks

But, where's me shades, my tungsten carbide burnisher throws scary sparks!! What a great challenge - would never have thought of trying that combination on my own!

 

[Martyn]

Neither of the two laminated blades by Trond I have access to spark very effectively - the firesteel deforms the (shaprish) edge on the blade's spine

Laminated blades are an odd one, it depends what the laminate is, how hard it is and how sharp it is. The Brusletto and Helle production laminated blade throw pretty good sparks from what I've heard, but traditonally makers tend to use a much softer metal for the laminate. It depends on who/how the maker laminates their blades. Some will work better than others. Some laminate their blades with a soft iron. Helle do laminates stainless blades - no worries throwing sparks with those.

 

[Adi007]

Just tried my firesteel againts my titanium alloy ring (Ti 6Al6V2Zn) - tentative at first :-? - and Wow! Sparks galore!

Not a scratch on the ring either. :-D

 

[Adi007]

Granite and slate both work too ...

Anyone tried it with a sharpish edge of perspex yet? I'm thinking that with a well gouged rod it might work.

 

[Doc]

Interesting that the Helle and Trond blades don't work too well - presumably due to the softer outer laminates. My Brusletto laminated knife doesn't spark well either. It's not just a Norwegian thing as my Frosts laminated Mora knife is not much better. Of course, there may be advantages to a laminated blade (hard edge yet flexible) but others know more about this than I do)

Carbon steel opinel is tres bien with the firesteel. C'est formidable!

 

[Martyn]

Granite and slate both work too ...

Anyone tried it with a sharpish edge of perspex yet? I'm thinking that with a well gouged rod it might work.

Can you expand on the quality of sparks?

I doubt perspex would work. I dont think it's hard enough. Yeah, you can get it sharp, but it's becomming evident that it's a combination of hardness & sharpness that does the trick. Glass works well, because it's very hard & very sharp - but perspex? Hmmm.

 

[Martyn]

Interesting that the Helle and Trond blades don't work too well - presumably due to the softer outer laminates. My Brusletto laminated knife doesn't spark well either. It's not just a Norwegian thing as my Frosts laminated Mora knife is not much better. Of course, there may be advantages to a laminated blade (hard edge yet flexible) but others know more about this than I do)

Carbon steel opinel is tres bien with the firesteel. C'est formidable!

Doc, which brusletto blade is it? Is it laminated with a soft metal or stainless? Can you comment on the "edge" of the spine? Remember, many of these knives need their spines grinding to get a decent spark out of them.

 

[Adi007]

I think that if I hit the rod hard enough witht he titanium alloy I could set the place on fire!!!! It's that good!

Slate and granite (both Welsh!!!), again, find a good edge and I could easily light cotton wool. Not as good as a steel edge but better than some bits on metal I've tried.

Old tin can (steel) works fine too ... I'll try a Al coke can in a moment.