MUG LID, RESIN GLUE AND FIRE WINDLASS and more! - things to make

[John Fenna]

Looking for other bits of info to post I came across some articles I wrote a while back but never published .... I thought they might be of interest ... so here we go

MUG LID, RESIN GLUE AND FIRE WINDLASS





In this article I am looking at the construction of what I hope will be a few useful bits and pieces to make life a little more comfortable and effortless when out in the woods: A lid to turn a military style mug into an efficient cooking pot, natural glue with which to make, seal or waterproof other items, and a simple fire windlass to place your billycan at just the right height over the flames for boiling, simmering or gently warming its contents.





Crusader Mug Lids


​

Metal military type mugs are excellent pieces of kit for bushcrafting purposes. I have a preference for the “Crusader Mug” from BCB Int. However, if you want to cook in them they all suffer from not having a lid.





With a little ingenuity and very basic tools it is not too hard to remedy this lack and make your own lid for your military mug in the comfort of your own home.





I start making my mug lids by finding a bit of scrap wood, in this case an old drawer front from the scrap wood pile, to make a “former”. Turning my mug upside down on the wood I draw around the rim and then carefully saw out the wooden former.





Your choice of materials for the lid depends on how robust you want it to be and here I show how to make lids from heavy gauge aluminium foil (a pound-shop turkey roasting tin) and medium weight aluminium (an old mess tin bought for pence at a car boot sale). For both weights you draw around the “former” onto your lid material and add a“border” no wider than the distance between the rim of your mug and the top of its folding handles.





For the foil lid you can use scissors to cut out your lid blank but the mess tin requires a metal saw of some type. In each case carefully cut out the blank ready to shape it over the former.





This is easily done with your fingers, or a pair of square nosed pliers for the foil lid(I leave a tab handle sticking out for ease of removing the lid) andyou will find you have lots of pleats forming in the foil. These may not look great, but the lid will work fine. Foil lids will bend easily in transport and require bending back into shape each time you use them, but are quick and easy to make!





The “Mess Tin” lids are harder, and more time-consuming to make, but almost seem to last forever.





To shape the mess tin aluminium, drill a hole in the centre of the lid blank and screw the blank to the former, making sure it is centred and with the “border”equal all the way around the former. You can then hammer the border down around the sides of the former, the metal deforming to fit fairly neatly.





Once you are happy with the shape of the lid on the former, unscrew it from the former and test it on your mug – it will probably need a bit of tweaking,mine always do! File and sand off any rough metal edges then cut a“button” handle from a stick of wood and screw this to the top of the lid using the hole already drilled in the lid, and your lid is complete.





Over the years I have made lots of lids this way, some with holes to act as strainer for when I am cooking pasta, rice or potatoes, and even one to support my essential coffee filter and, apart from almost disposable foil models, they are all still going strong.





Pine Resin Glue





If you have ever come in contact with resin bleeding from a damaged coniferous tree, then you already know that it is very sticky. This property alone makes it a good basis for a natural glue.





Unfortunately, resin tends to get very brittle as it dries out, but if you can keep it a little pliable, then it is ideal for use in many situations where a glue or pitch is needed.





My basic recipe for Pine Resin Glue uses resin from almost any conifer (Sitka Spruce is ideal and there are lots of Sitka planted in vast swathes around Britain), beeswax as a plasticizer and some fine ground charcoal to temper and hold it all together.





Always source your resin from trees already bleeding – sites where contractors are felling often have damaged trees from collisions between their vehicles and trees not felled! Do not enter working sites, but wait until the contractors have moved on and you have free access as this gives time for large amounts of resin to bleed out and become easily available. Never damage a healthy tree just for a bit of resin!





Beeswax is often sold in small blocks in hardware, furniture and even healthfood shops, while charcoal can come from your fireplace or BBQ!





I find a mix of two parts resin to one part wax and O.5 part of charcoal works well, but feel free


to experiment – you could also replace the charcoal with dried rabbit dung if you like(trust me, it works!).





Melt the wax in a metal pot, then add the resin and charcoal. Remove it from the heat and mix as it cools with a twig or thin stick.





If you allow the cooling mixture to accumulate on the stick, you end up with primitive“glue sticks”.





To use the glue, melt your glue stick and drip hot glue into the areas to be joined. You will need to keep the glue hot until you have everything lined up.





I have joined wood,secured spear heads (bone, stone and metal), fletched arrows and waterproofed natural fibre cordage with this mix over the years, with excellent results.





A Fire Windlass





Afire windlass is a simple device that allows you to securely raise and lower a billycan in small increments to get its ideal position over the fire for ensuring the right amount of heat, whether you want to boil, simmer or gently heat the contents.





To make a fire windlass you need to make a “fire frame” (a forked pole set up each side of the fire with a cross pole resting in the forks, crossing the fire) but choose a strong and thick pole for the cross pole.





Where the round pole sits in the fork you will see that it has a gap under it and the pole can easily rotate. To avoid this rotation you need to cut the cross pole where it sits in the fork, to a triangular section to fit the fork.





To create the triangular section you simply cut 3 pairs of stop cuts around the pole each just deep enough to meet the next cut at around bark level. With axe and/or knife, remove the wood between each pair of stop cuts and you will have your triangular section which, when placed in the fork of the fire frame upright pole, will stop any tendency of the cross pole to rotate.





You can cut triangular sections into the cross pole at either, both or at just one end.





The“billycan suspension system” can be made from cord, wire or, as I have done in this example, from light chain. Whatever you use to dangle your billy by, it needs to be securely fixed to the pole so that it cannot snap under load.





Secure knots should work for cord or wire, but in the case of the chain used here, I opened up the end link and hammered one end into the pole as an anchor hook – and then tied the chain around the pole in a clove hitch as well! Note – small karabiners can be awkward to use when hot. I have swapped the one in the photos for a hook since I took the pictures…





The length of your cord, wire or chain “suspension system” should be such that fully extended it should rest the billycan on the bed of the fireplace.





To raise or lower the billycan you simply lift the triangular section(s)of the cross pole out of the fork and rotate the pole so that the cord, wire or chain, is wound around (or is unwound from) the pole to the height above the flames that you desire. Resting the triangular section back into the fork effectively locks the suspension system at that height.





A simple and elegant cooking heat control that can be compared to turning the knob on a cooker at home.






PHOTO CAPTIONS





Crusader Mug Lids


1 Scrapwood, mug and pen


2 Markedout


3 Formercut out and lid materials


4 Lids marked out


5 Lids cut out


6 Foil lid shaped


7 Heavy lid screwed to former


8 Hammeredto shape


9 Finished lid


10 Variouslids


11 Various lids





Pine Resin Glue


1 Resin bleeding from a damaged tree


2 Resin,beeswax, charcoal dust, pot


3 Gluesticks


4 Some items joined, sealed and waterproofed with the glue





Fire Windlass


1 Select a strong pole


2 Round pole in forked stick


3 Cutting the round pole to a triangular section


4 Triangular section in forked stick


5 Chain hammered into the pole


6 Billy hung high


7 Billy hung too high to boil


8 Billy lowered onto the flames

 

[John Fenna]

CAMP GADGETS





In this article I am going to look at a few items that are oh-so-useful and oh-so-easy to make.





The first item is a “toggle guy”, simply a length of paracord
with a wooden toggle at one end and at the other either a fixed loop,an adjustable loop or – a plain end.





The “toggle guy” makes pitching your tarp fast and easy as,instead of tying each guy to the loops on the tarp, you just pop thetoggle into place.





I usually use a roughly 5m length of paracord and have a fixed loop,made from a “fig 8 on the bight” knot at one end and the toggleat the other.





The toggle is made from a 5-8cm long piece of thumb-thick wood and Ieither cut a notch in the centre or drill in two holes (with my SwissArmy knife's awl) to retain the cord. With the notched toggle I tieon with a clove hitch with a long “tail”, which I then tie backto the main length of paracord with a few half hitches. With thedrilled version I thread the cord through the holes and tie it offwith a series of half hitches. I chamfer the ends of the toggles forcomfort and ease of use.





As a variant of this kind of toggle guy, I have used some lightweight4mm bungee cord, doubled, to make my own “bungee hooks” using atoggle at one end and a fixed loop at the other.





The toggle guys with fixed loops can be linked together, loop totoggle, to make a longer guy, while the loop does not interfere ifyou want to make an adjustable loop somewhere along the length of thecord.





Toggle guys can also be used to suspend billycans over fires bymaking a toggle guy fire tripod.


Use the cord to tie three strong poles together at one end, to formthe tripod and leave the toggle hanging. Pleace the tripod over yourfire and hang the bail of your billycan over the toggle.


You can adjust the hight of the billycan by looping the toggle cordover the top of the tripod.





Tomake an adjustable loop





1. Make a loop in your cord with a long working part.


2. Wrap the working part two or three times around one part of theloop.


3. Lay the working end over the standing part of the cord.


4. Tuck a bight of the working end through the “eye” between theloop and standing part of the cord.


5. Work the knot tight.





This knot locks under load, but slides easily when not under load,and works like a commercial “slider” on guy lines.





A pull on the end of the cord allows the knot to be easily undone. If you do not use a bight to finish the knot, it is very hard toundo.





Alashed pot hook





Sometimes you find that the bail handle on a billycan is too wide tofit in a pot hook with a carved suspension hook. A double ended pothook solves this problem.





Choose two forked sticks with fairly straight “shafts” and shapeeach of these to make a “lap” joint by thinning an equal lengthof each so they lie neatly together.





Notch both parts on the outer side to act as “stock notches” whenyou come to lashing the pieces together.





Drill a hole through both pieces. I use the awl on my Swiss ArmyKnife for most drilling in the field and peg the two pieces togetherbefore strongly lashing everything together.





The notches stop the lashing slipping under load and the peg (or pegs- you can use more than one if your load is going to be heavy) holdseverything together.





SimpleFire Crane





Sometimes simple is best and for a quick way of holding a billycanover a fire, this simple fire crane may be all you need. To make thefire crane all you need are two strong poles each between 4ft and 6ftlong and some strong cordage. I prefer one end of one pole to beforked, but this is not essential.





Put a strong point on one end of one of the poles and hammer itfirmly into the ground a couple of feet from your fire.





Take the other pole – preferably forked – and tie it to the polethat is fixed to the ground. In the photos I have used two turns of“utility cord” but four to six turns of paracord is also good.





Hang your billycan on the forked end of the cross pole. The weightof the billycan and its contents will make the cross-pole dip andwill tighten the cord joining the poles to make it non-slip. If itdips too far, tighten the cord joining the poles before loading thecross-pole again, or tie a counter balance to the other end of thecross-pole.





The fork in the cross-pole should stop your billycan from slidingoff, but if you cannot find a forked stick, then you will need to cuta stopper notch about 2-3 inches from the end of the pole.





When the billycan is boiling, you can push on the counter balance endof the cross-pole to swing your billycan away from the flames. Toadjust the height of the billycan above the flames you can slide thecross-pole up or down the upright while the cross-pole is unladen.





A simple, but effective fire crane for short term use.








CampGadgets


Photocaptions





An Adjustable Loop Knot


1 Form a loop


2 Wrap the working end around


3 Cross the standing part


4 Tuck a bight through


5 Work the knot tight





Lashed Pot Hook


1 Hook ends shaped and notched


2 Hook ends shaped and notched


3 Shape the hook ends to fit neatly


4 Drill a hole through both halves


5 Peg through the holes


6 Lash the halves together tightly





Toggle Guys


1 Cut a length of wood and drill two holes in the centre


2 Or cut a groove around the centre


3 Tie 5m of paracord through the holes or around the notch and a fig8 on the bight at the other end


4 You can use light, but strong bungee cord doubled up instead ofparacord


6 Notched style on tarp


7 Bungee style around tree


8 Bungee style on tarp and tree


9 Drilled cord style on tarp


10 Supporting tarp


11 Toggle guy holding billycan


12 Toggle guy fire tripod





Fire Crane


1 Select two poles


2 Point one end of one pole


3 Hammer the pointed pole firmly into the ground


4 Hang the billy off the cross-pole


5 Billy on fire crane


6 Billy on fire crane

A simple adjustable loop knot

​

 

[John Fenna]

CAMPFIRE ACCESSORIES





In this article I am going to look at a selection of items that can make cooking on your camp fire a little more convenient. All of these items can be made “in the field” and then left on site for future use, burnt at the end of your camp or taken home for use on future trips. The tools needed for these projects are the standard knife and saw of a bushcraft toolkit, though for the “tension trays” secateurs can be useful as well. Leatherman used to make a secateur-based multi tool which was an excellent bit of kit, but mine“disappeared” and now I use some I picked up at a garden centre.





One of my basic bits of campfire cooking kit is a pot hook and I use several of different lengths over a fire so that I can adjust how much heat a pot is getting (from full boil to the gentlest of simmer)over fires of various sizes.





Pot hooks can be hung on a cooking frame – two forked sticks driven into the ground, or have tripods, one each side of the fire, which support a long strong pole – or suspended on chains or cords from fire cranes etc, or lashed upside down on tree trunks or, hung from branches can keep your food bags out of the way of foraging wildlife.





To make your pot hook, find a forked stick – although I prefer hazel, most any wood will work – that has a fork wide enough to fit over your cooking frame's cross pole and which is at least thumb thick. Cut the stick about 2-3cm below the fork and cut the thinnest part of the fork to about 5-8cm length. The thicker part, which will hold your billy-can, can be cut to any length you need to hold the billy at the “right height” over the flames.





Bevel off all the cut ends and if you wish, remove the bark from the stick.





The hook to take your billy-can's bail handle should be formed about 3cm from the end of the long fork. Making the fork just above a knot in the wood helps avoid a straight grain which might split the hook off.





Cut a cross into the wood on the opposite side of the stick to the hanging hook. The cut needs to be at least one-third the thickness of the stick. Slice away three-quarters of the cross cut to leave a point that faces up the stick to the fork.





Whittle out the wood behind the point to form a hook that will securely hold the billy-can's handle and your pot hook is ready for use.





If you find a suitably sized stick that has multiple forks you can make an adjustable pot hook by making a series of hanging hooks above the pot hanging point.





A “billy stick” is a useful gadget for helping you pour out the contents of your billy-can without worrying about accidental spills.





Again, it is made from a forked stick, this time preferably one with a wide and even fork. The size of the forked stick is determined by the size of your billy-can. A hook for the billy-can's handle is cut below the fork (pointing away from the fork) just as in the pot hook project, and positioned so, when hung on this hook, the billy can sits securely in the forks of the stick with the rim of the bully-can far enough down from the fork to allow a “clean” pour.





To stop the billy-can sliding towards the fork as you pour, cut a notch – to hold the rim of the billy-can in each of the branches of the fork. Once you are happy that the billy stick will hold your billy-can securely as you tip it to pour, you can trim the forks to length. I try to make them reach to one-third way down the billycan.





Not all camp cooking is done in a billy-can and I like to build a“toaster” out of green wood for grilling bacon, toasting or warming bannock bread, warming up wraps etc.





Again, a forked stick is needed, this time with as wide a fork as is possible to find. Peel the bark off the wood and then cut shallow notches in the top of the forks near the tip and about half-way down the fork on the underside.





These notches are to hold the cross pieces made from peeled twigs or splits of wood. A third peeled twig or split is then woven under and over these cross pieces to hold them in place just with the tension of the wood.





You can, of course, make your toaster any size you want, with as many cross pieces as you need. If you want to toast both sides of your food, you can slip extra splits over your food to hold it in place so you can turn the toaster over without tipping food in the fire.





Most toasters only last a short time and I consider them disposable,but a similar technique is used to make “tension trays” and full-on “green stick grills”.





Tension trays can be used for all sorts of purposes from food prep and serving to taking home for plant pot stands, and are simple to make.





A circular frame is made from a supple twig – willow is ideal –either by lashing the tip to the butt or by twisting the ends a longeach other to make the circle.





One or two pieces are then placed on top and across the centre of the circle to form the “spine” of the tension tray. This spine can be left overlapping the circular frame as handles, or cut short if you want a plain tray. Lengths of wood are then woven into the tray alternatively “on top of the frame, under the spine, on top of the frame” and “under the frame, on top of the spine, under the frame”.





If you weave these pieces in with large gaps, you have a green-stick grill and can trap your food under extra weavers or weave in the pieces tightly, without gaps, to form trays or platters. Trimming the ends of the weavers gives a neat finish.





“Platters”can also be woven out of other materials, such as brambles, if you do not have suitable wood to hand for tension trays.





The platters are made in the same way as making the base of a basket.





Strip off the thorns from your chosen brambles – I run the brambles through tough canvas held in my gloved hands – and cut 8 spokes a little longer than the width of platter you want. Use thicker bramble stems for these spokes.





Take four of the spokes and make a lengthwise split in the middle of each, just a bit longer than the width of the other 4 spokes. Thread these 4 spokes through the splits to make a cross.





Take a thin and supple “weaver” bramble and fold it in half around one arm of the cross and weave each end around the arms of the cross to give at least 2 full wraps, going over and under each arm of the cross and also crossing the other half of the weaver between each arm.





Once the two wraps are completed, spread the spokes out evenly and weave more supple brambles in and out of them, crossing the weavers as you go. When the weavers get too thick to weave easily, trim them off and start a new weaver, overlapping the original weaver for a couple of turns for security.





When you have woven to near the ends of the spokes you can finish off by tucking the ends of the weavers into the platter down the side of a spoke. The ends of the spokes can be woven into the platter,tucked down the side of the next spoke or just trimmed off.





Hopefully, the photos will help clarify these instructions.





Enjoy your campfire cooking!








CAMPFIREACCESSORIES


PHOTOCAPTIONS





Billy stick


1 pouring


2


3 notches





Pot Hook


1 forked stick trimmed to size


2 cross cut for hook


3 cross cut whittled out


4 cross cut whittled out and shaped


5 Pot bail securely held


6 Pot hook in use





Tension trays


1 twisted hoop and weavers


2 stop here for a greenstick grill


3 with handle ready for trimming


4 tension trays and platters


Toaster


1 toaster


2 warming a wrap





Woven Platters


1 bramble spokes


2 spokes split and made into basic cross


3 starting to twine the weavers


4 starting to weave around each spoke


5 weaving the platter


6 platter complete and ready to trim


​

 

[John Fenna]

CARVED COOKING KIT





For me part of bushcrafting is “self reliance” when out in the woods, and I often take minimal commercially made kit and make what I need on site.





Sometimes things made on site are kept and used long-term on othe rcamps or at home, sometimes just treated as one-offs and discarded to stay part of the ecological cycle of the site.





In this article I am looking at making a set of “carved cooking kit”, fork, spoon, spatula and tongs from wood found on site. I have only finished these items to “good enough” standard as I had no intention of keeping them for long-term use. You could, of course take a bit more time finishing these items and use them time and time again – perhaps even turning them into family heirlooms to be handed down the generations… The wood I used for the projects was sustainably harvested for firewood or was being cleared anyway so that returning it to the environment was not a negative action.





The“Fast Fork”





A fork is a handy bit of cooking – and eating - kit. You could simply point up a stick for most cooking forks, but for eating steaks or spaghetti, noodles etc a three-tined fork is the ideal tool and is easy to make.





Here I chose a billet of willow and split out a slightly curved profile rectangle about the length of a standard dining fork. With a bit of charcoal from my fireplace I drew out my design on the wood and roughly shaped the head and handle with my knife. The tines were cut in using my folding saw and then whittled to shape.





The points of the tine need to be pretty sharp for most of a fork's work but I left the tines fairly chunky to avoid breakage if the steak I was going to cook proved a bit tough. Heat treating the tines at the fire would make the points harder and less likely to break while, if you wanted to keep the fork for future use, drying and seasoning the finished article would allow you to refine the finish, and sand and oil it for a beautiful as well as useful final item.





A“Swift Spoon”


Spoon carving is a traditional bushcrafting pastime; some spoons are finished to an incredible level and can be works of art. This one is just a “user”. Here I chose a random piece of round wood about one-third again as long as the spoon I wanted, and split it in half.





Leaving myself a bit to use as a handhold on what would be the end of the bowl, on the opposite side to the handle, I cut deep notches to mark out the size of the spoon bowl;.





I find a spoon with a “cranked” handle more comfortable to use. I cut the handle side of the bowl lower than the “point” end before I started hollowing out the spoon bowl with a standard Frost made spoon knife, cut across the grain for a cleaner cut.





For an eating spoon you do not want a deep bowl – your upper lips hould touch the bottom of the bowl as you eat to get out all the goodies – but a cooking or serving spoon can be as deep as you like.





Once you have the bowl cut you can shape the back of the spoon. This can be shaped quite thin to the bowl, a couple of millimetres is great, and you can use your finger and thumb in a pinch as a gauge.





Before you shape away the holder at the point of the bowl, you can also shape the handle of the spoon. Do not make the join between the handle and the bowl too narrow or shallow – this is the usual point of breakage! The normal pattern is a thin-ish join but deep. For a“one-off” use the finish does not need to be fantastic, but avoid leaving sharp edges or splinters.





A“Simple Spatula”





If you enjoy a good fry-up on camp then a spatula is going to be a valuable bit of kit and is probably the simplest bit of cooking kit to carve.





I chose a straight-grained lump of seasoned oak firewood for this project and although it proved to give a fairly short handled spatula, it was otherwise ideal.





With my axe I split off a thin oblong of wood about 1.5cm thick and 8cm wide (if only about 21cm long – a bit short really..) and again with charcoal I drew out my design. As you can see from my photos I changed my mind as to the design before settling on a round shouldered blade with an angled front edge.





The next step was to saw in the shape of the shoulders with my folding saw before splitting out the handle with a tap from the axe. The saw cuts act as a “stop cut” to stop the split extending into the blade of the spatula.





The basic shape of the spatula is now complete and all that is left is to taper the back of the spatula down to the angled edge, slightly“dish” the top of the spatula blade and round off the handle for comfort.





I like to leave the edge of a spatula about 1mm thick.





All the shaping of the blade and handle can be done with axe and knife until you feel you are happy with the finish.





“TerrificTongs”





A pair of tongs is one piece of cooking kit that I never though I needed, until I made my first ones and then I wondered how I ever did without them! Turning sausages in the pan, picking up bacon,retrieving items from inside boiling billycans – tongs are terrific bits of kit.





This quick pair of tongs was cut from a rod of hazel about 3 times as long as I wanted the working part of the tongs to be.





After I had removed the bark, I thinned the central third of the rod to between one-half and one-third its original thickness. To do this I sawed “stop cuts” into the rod and cut away between them. This thinned section is the “spring” of the tongs and needs to flex well.





I kept trying the flex of the wood as I thinned it, trying to avoid having weak bits that would hinge and break, or stiff bits that would not bend with the rest.





Warming the wood over your fire helps bend the wood without its plitting.





Once the spring is made I shaped the tips of the tongs so that they met with flat “gripping” surfaces as I squeezed the tongs,testing them by picking up leaves!





Once everything is shaped and working I find that holding them bent for use is a good idea so I drilled a couple of holes in the handles using the awl on my Swiss Army Knife and threaded a bit of cord through them tying it off at a suitable flex position for the tongs.





If you keep your tongs they will season and hold the shape they are tied in and eventually the string is redundant.





In all this carving it is important to keep your tools sharp for best results – and to avoid slips! An old friend once told me “never cut uphill”, meaning up into the grain, as this can cause splits where you don't want 'em. Cut down or across the grain for clean cuts and never cut towards yourself – blood leaves ugly stains on the wood!





If you do decide to keep your carved cooking kit for future use, then a fine finish can be achieved by refining the cuts then sanding and oiling the wood. Use food-safe plant oils that are “setting oils”,i.e. which do not go rancid with age. I use either flax seed oil or walnut oil. Olive oil is out as it tastes foul after it goes off!





CARVED COOKING KIT


PHOTO CAPTIONS





Fast Fork


1 the cut billet


2 the split billet


3 the fork marked out in charcoal


4 roughly shaped


5 times cut with a saw


6 whittled to shape





Swift Spoon


1 cut to length


2 split


3 mark bowl size


4 profile spoon


5 profile spoon 2


6 carve bowl


7 shape back of bowl


8 shape away holder


9 field finished


10 field finished. Let it dry for fine finishing and sanding.





Simple Spatula


1 select a log with straight grain


2 split out a thin oblong


3 saw in the shoulders


4 split out the handle to the shoulders


5 shape the spatula with axe and knife





Terrific Tongs


1 cut a rod


2 thin the centre third


3 carefully bend the tongs to shape


4 shape the ends to meet


5 test by gripping thin items


6


​

​

 

[John Fenna]

More to come when I find time....

 

[John Fenna]

FIRE FURNITURE – BLOW POKER, STRAP HINGE TRIVET, FIRE TONGS





Some easily made bits of kit can make working at the campfire easier and, to a degree, safer, and are worth the effort of construction for longer trips into the trees or for permanent sites. Amongst these items are a blow poker, a simple metal trivet and fire tongs.





Blow Poker





A blow poker is simply a tube that allows you to blow air into the fire without having to crouch down close to the base of the fire(thus endangering your eyebrows!) to blow up the fire, and is easily constructed on site.





To make a blow poker all you need is a straightish stem of Elder wood some 18”-24” (50-60cm) long and something to remove the soft pith from the centre of the stem.





Luckily elder has a very soft pith and it can be removed using a sharpened twig of the right length and bore or – if you can find a discarded length of fence wire (and I find that farmers often leave this lying around after fending) - this is even more effective. In this case I found some copper wire.





If you cut the twig to provide a long, but strong point – about a 45-75 degree cut usually lasts well and “cuts” well, but may need renewing a couple of times in use – or hammer the end of the wire flat and grind it on a rock to give a sharp spear point, then that is all you need as tools.





Drive your borer into the end of the pith and twist away,occasionally withdrawing the borer to pull out the pith. You may need to work from both ends and, if there have been side shoots, the“nodes” where these grew may take extra effort to bore out. If you are using a wire borer then heating this up to red hot in the fire can help burn through the nodes (and pith) with ease.





Once the pith has been cleared out I like to draw coarse or knotted string through the “bore” to remove the last of the pith and dust.





To prevent some “useful” friend using the blow poker as firewood(it has happened to me more than once) it is best to identify your blow poker by whipping the upper part with something – leather thong, day glo paracord etc, and cleaning the bark off the“mouthpiece”. Incorporating a hanging loop into the whipping helps avoid said “helpful” friend sticking it into the ashes after use and clogging the bore, or getting the mouthpiece covered in ashes etc.





A quick and easy blow poker can be made at home from any metal tubing– old tent poles, broken arrows or crossbow bolts, or even old telescoping radio aerial. These all make excellent blow pokers, the latter one being ideal for carrying on short trips.





Strap Hinge Trivet





A strap hinge trivet is a quick and easy item to make at home and only requires 3 “strap” type hinges with strong, equal length straps ( I find 8” (20cm) ideal) and a short bolt with a wing nut to fit.





All you need do is bolt the hinges together by one end of each strap and the job is done. Ensure the bolt protrudes on the “down”side of the trivet when it is opened and does not stop the trivet folding down to a “pizza slice” configuration for carrying.





Touse the trivet, open the “arms” up to 120 degrees each (a Mercedes Benz symbol) and fold the “legs” down to as far as they will go – which should be more than 90 degrees. Digging the legs into the ground adds stability and acts as a leveller. Be sure to burn off any zinc coating or paint from the trivet before using it for cooking – the fumes are not good for you.





This kind of trivet is strong enough for all sorts of cast iron ware cooking and will support even quite large Dutch ovens with ease, yetis not heavy in itself and is easy to carry (if you protect other gear from the bolt.) Used on the fire the metal will eventually rust, but you get plenty of warning before it gets too weak to use.





Fire Tongs





A useful piece of fireside kit is a long pair of tongs to help re-arrange hot logs, embers and coals, or for placing and retrieving cans being used to cook up char cloth – all without singeing your fingers.





To make a set of fire tongs you need to select a pole just a bit over twice the length of tongs you want, i.e. if you want 1 metre tongs you will require a pole about 2m 20cm or so long. The pole will need to have a good fork up to 45 degrees at one end, each arm some 10-15cm long and as few side shoots along the pole as possible, and needs to be no more than broomstick thick at its thick end.





Find the centre of the pole, and about 10cm either side of this make a “stop cut” between one-quarter and one-third of the way through the pole. These cuts need to be in the same plane as the width of the fork.





Thin out the 20cm centre of the pole from stop cut to stop cut using axe or knife until you can bend the pole in half, flexing evenly along the thinned section, and the butt end of the pole lies between the arms of the fork so that the arms of the fork and butt end are equally long.





This thinning and bending needs to be done slowly and carefully to avoid over-thinning and weakening the spring of the tongs, or even snapping the tongs in half. Keep testing the flex of the thinned section and ensure the spring does not have stiff sections which need thinning. Warming the wood can help it flex. The flex needs to be as even as possible.





Once you are happy with the flex of the tongs, drill holes about 8cm beyond the stop cuts and thread through a piece of cord. Tie stopper knots in the cord to stop the tongs springing too far open and being hard to grip, but while still allowing the “jaws” of the tongs to grasp reasonably sized objects.





The finishing touch on the tongs is to wrap the “spring” in cord– hi viz synthetic cord is ideal so that in low light your precious tongs are not mistaken for firewood and used on the fire.





Have fun, but be safe with your fires.





FIRE FURNITURE


PHOTO CAPTIONS





Blow Poker


1 Elder tree


2 Elder tree in flower


3 Cut straight Elder stem


4 Pith


5 Removing the pith with a sharp twig


6 Removing the pith with a sharp twig


7 Removing the pith with a wire


8 Removing the pith with a wire


9 Using string to clean the tube


10 Finished blow poker


11 Broken bolt blow poker





Fire Tongs


1 Select a fork stick


2 Stop cuts


3 Thin the centre


4 Drill cord holes


5 Finished


6 Finished


7 Tongs meet well


8 Gripping a char cloth can


9 In use making char cloth





Strap Hinge Trivet


1 Folded


2 Half open


3 Bolt detail


4 Opened


5 Strong enough for Dutch oven cooking


6 Cooking bannock


7 With an oiled bakestone


8 Bannock and coffee





29 Fire furniture collection

​

 

[John Fenna]

SIMPLECARVING PROJECTS


Woodland whistle, ranger beads, 2-for-1 tent peg





Tent pegs – you can never have too many - while a whistle and Ranger Beads are useful bits of kit as well. None of these are difficult carving projects and can be fun ways to practise your carving skills.





2-for-1 Tent Pegs





Here is a quick and easy way to make tent pegs – and it takes only about half the effort of carving each peg individually!





Find a good straight grained pole from which to cut your tent pegs –Ash is a favourite for this. For most applications I would look for something about 3-4cm diameter and cut lengths of some 25-35cm.





With your axe, roughly point each pole, firstly cutting from about half-way up one side (the front) to within about 1cm from the “back”at the end, and then each side from about half way up to leave thepoint about 2cm wide. The “point” should therefore measure about 2x1cm.





With a saw, cut into the pole at a 90 degree angle to about one-third to one-half the width of the pole. Make the cut some 4-5cm down from the top of the pole and in the “front” of your pole. Carefully cut out the cord notch using axe or knife. The notch should be in the same face of the pole as your first axe cuts that shaped the front of the “point”.





Carefully split each pole using axe or knife so that the split divides the notch and point of each pole equally to form two pegs.





Quickly chamfer all sharp edges to stop guy-lines wearing and to stop the head of the peg splitting as you pound the peg into the ground,and refine the point of the peg (points under 1x1cm can break too easily) and your pegs are done … in half the usual time!








Ranger Beads





Ranger beads, also known as “pace counter beads”, are a useful navigational and are quite simple to make.





Basically you have 14 beads on a string, divided into a top group of 5 and a bottom group of 9, the string has a loop at the top so you can clip it to your rucksack harness, a knot about 3-4cm below the top set of beads to divide the groups and a knot 3-4cm below the bottom set of beads to stop the beads falling off.





The way I prefer to use the beads is to count distance walked. To do this I measure – on the flat – how many paces I take to 100m(counting on my right footfall only) then every time I have walked 100m one of the lower beads is slid from top to the bottom. When the ninth bead has been pushed down, I have walked 900m. After the next 100m the 9 beads are slid back to the top and one of the upper beads is slid to the bottom, and so on. For short distances I count each bead on 10m only.





Equally, you can count your paces, moving one bead per 10 paces taken, and work out your distance covered from that.





Ranger beads can, of course be used as a tally for anything you need to count in large numbers.





For the beads I made this time, I chose several knot-free lengths of pencil-thick Ash. At this size Ash twigs have a pithy centre that is easy to remove, so is a good choice for bead-making.





I chose to leave the bark on these beads and simply marked out bead lengths of approx the same length as the width of the twigs.





I started shaping the beads by cutting “V” notches around the twigs at these marks. I always cut more beads than I really need as there are always a couple I manage to split, while keeping the beads together on the twig for as long as possible makes handling them easier.





Once the beads are almost finished, I break the twigs down to groups of 2-4 beads together to make boring out the centre of the beads easier. Once they are bored out I run a length of rough twine through the bead clusters to clean out any loose material before I cut each bead free and clean up the cut ends.





Dividing the beads into a group of 9 and a group of 5 (usually the larger of the beads), I then string the beads. Any cordage that fits the beads loosely enough to permit movement and tightly enough so as not to accidentally slip is ideal. Here I used doubled sisal cord, a cord that is both strong and cheap as well as being a natural product.





Simple Carving Projects


Photo Captions


Woodland whistle, ranger beads, 2-for-1 tent pegs





Woodland whistle


1 Select your stick


2 Bore out the centre


3 Bore out the centre


4 Cut the wedge out


5 Whittle the fipple


6 Flatten the top of the fipple


7 Fit and glue the fipple


8 Shape the mouthpiece


9 Finished


10 A small orchestra of whistles





Ranger Beads


1 Cut several knot-free lengths of Ash


2 Mark equally sized bead lengths


3 V cut to start shaping beads


4 Shorten the lengths


5 Bore out the beads


6 Separate the beads and clean up the cut edge


7 Separate the beads into a set of 9 and a set of 5


8 Thread the beads





2-for-1 tent pegs


1 Cut poles for your tent pegs


2 Roughly point one end of your poles


3 Cut the cord notches


4 Split each pole in half


5 Each pole is now two pegs


6 Chamfer all sharp edges


​

 

[John Fenna]

MAKING AN MOD SHELTER SHEET HAMMOCK





A look at making a comfortable hammock





When I am sleeping out in the woods my old and often aching bones do not respond well to sleeping on the ground any more and I prefer to use a hammock or “stretcher bed”.





As a stretcher bed requires a lot of wood to build (for two strong tripod supports and two side poles of approximately 12ft which require renewing every so often as they age and rot) I reserve these superbly comfortable beds for sites I use often and which have a sustainable density of suitable timber.





A standard hammock is more suitable for other sites, but I find most commercial hammocks a bit claustrophobic. As a consequence I have designed and made several of my own which give me more comfort, are not prone to become a “sausage skin” in the night and allow me to even sleep comfortably on my side.





For my stretcher beds I use a British MoD shelter sheet, the one with all the webbing reinforcement and handles that allow it to be used as a stretcher for casualties in the field, as it is a very strong and versatile piece of kit at between £20 and £40, depending on condition.





I recently had a play with such a shelter sheet and came up with a simple way of making it into a very comfortable hammock.





The hammock itself is simply made by taking the shelter sheet and folding it in half length ways and sewing the open sides together to form a tube. I do this by melting holes through the webbing edge reinforcements every inch (leaving the stretcher handles free) using an old steel tent peg heated in the flames of a camping stove. I usefull-strength “550 paracord” to sew through these holes and also lash the eyelets together for extra strength.





At the corner handles I tie on 2ft to 3ft lengths of paracord as tie-offs and in the centre of each short side I add 2ft to 3ft cords to close the ends and as tie-offs.





In a stretcher bed these allow you to close the tube to stop your kipmat insulation from escaping, and in the sheltersheet hammock to also attach the sheet to the end poles.





For the end bars you need to cut two strong trustworthy poles, each about 6ft long. Here I have used green oak poles.





The poles are threaded through the corner handles of the sheltersheet tube with an equal amount protruding from each side and the paracord tie-offs on each handle used to tension the width of sheet. Here I have used clove hitches, but rolling hitches would be an even better knot to use.





At the foot of the hammock the centre tie-off is used to close the end of the tube and attach it to the pole, but I leave the head end open at this point so I can slide in my kipmat after the hammock is hung.





To suspend my hammock I have used 4 looped canoe tie-down straps closed with a cam action buckle. I chose to use these as (1) I had them handy; (2) they are very strong; (3) they are easy to adjust,and (4) they are very “grippy”. However, you can also use rope,as will be described later.





With the straps I attached them to the poles with clove hitches and used commercial climbing kit webbing loops and a climbers screw gate karabiner to attach them to the trees at each end. The webbing loops were simply wrapped around the tree and the karabiners clipped to join the looped canoe straps and the climbing webbing loops and screwed closed.





The cam action buckles on the canoe straps were then used to balance the set of the hammock and a “security hitch” quick-release thumbknot put in to ensure there was no slippage.





If you prefer to use rope or cordage to hang your hammock, there area couple of options on how to do so.





You could tie individual ropes to each pole end, using a rolling hitch, and tie each of these to the support trees individually using a round turn and two half hitches. This could prove very secure, but time consuming to fix and balance.





Another alternative is to use one length of rope at each end of the hammock. Tie a loop using a figure-of-eight on the bight in thec entre of the rope and attach each end to the hammock pole. The central loop can then be attached to its tree with a loop and karabiner, or you could tie a single rope to the loop with a sheetbend or double sheet bend, and this tied to the tree. Balancing the hammock would only involve adjusting one rolling hitch at either end of the hammock.





Ensure that all the equipment you use is sound, all knots and hitches etc correctly tied and secure and everything is safe before committing yourself to your bed!
After about 6 years of use I have found that some of the MOD stitching on the handles is failing - so I have reinforced the handle loops with copper rivets and added rope "back-up loops tied around the hanging points! I have also replaced the webbing suspension straps with spliced "polyhemp" rope loops and strops - just for the look of things





If you are concerned that the hammock might flip in the night and dump you on the ground, you can add paracord guys to each end of the poles to limit the possible travel of the poles and prevent the hammock turning over. I have yet to find hammocks do this to me…



































MOD SHELTERSHEET HAMMOCK





The rolling hitch or magnus hitch





The rolling, or “Magnus” hitch, is of the same family of hitches as the clove hitch, but is designed to take the strain of a more lengthwise pull and is a good alternative to the clove hitch if the pull is more than 45 degrees.





To tie the rolling hitch:





Take a generous length of the end of the rope or string you are working with and take the end of the rope twice around the pole or stick you are wanting to tie it to, to the right of the standing part of the rope, crossing over itself on top of the pole each time.





Take a third turn around the pole to the left of the standing part and tuck the end under itself on top of the pole to make it secure. Tighten the knot up and add a stopper knot in the end of your rope –just to be on the safe side!





Test the knot by jerking the rope at a sharp angle..








Figure-of-Eight on the Bight





To tie a figure-of-eight on the bight to make a centre loop in your rope:





1. Make a loop at the exact centre of the rope


2. Pass the rope over itself


3. Under itself


4. and back down from the top side through eye so formed


5. The knot should resemble a figure “8” (hence the name)


6. Pull the loop to tighten the knot






























































MOD SHELTERSHEET HAMMOCK





PHOTO CAPTIONS





1. MoD sheltersheet hammock Open sides sewn together


2. MoD sheltersheet hammock Eyelets lashed together


3. MoD sheltersheet hammock Tree hanger


4. MoD sheltersheet hammock Two 6ft long poles


5. MoD sheltersheet hammock Hammock poles threaded through the handles


6. MoD sheltersheet hammock Detail of handles tied out to the poles


7. MoD sheltersheet hammock Tied to poles


8. MoD sheltersheet hammock Attaching straps to poles


9. MoD sheltersheet hammock Straps attached to poles


10. MoD sheltersheet hammock Straps clipped into the tree hangers


11. MoD sheltersheet hammock Security hitch


12. MoD sheltersheet hammock Finished hammock





13. Rolling hitch 1


14. Rolling hitch 2


15. Rolling hitch 3


16. Rolling hitch 4





17. Figure-of-eight on the bight 1


18. Figure-of-eight on the bight 2


19. Figure-of-eight on the bight 3


20. Figure-of-eight on the bight 4

​

 

[John Fenna]

BUSHCRAFT BOOZE





When spending some time out in the woods it is often pleasant to partake of a small alcoholic beverage, and it is so much nicer if the drink is made from wild resources that you have foraged from the woods around you.





The “Bushcraft Booze” that I get asked about most are “Birchsap Wine” and “Sloe Gin”, two very nice drinks, but once you have the kit to make those drinks you may find you wish to expand into making other hedgerow wines and spirits, so I include here recipes for Rosehip Wine and Blackberry Vodka. For the non-drinkers I also include a recipe for Elderflower Cordial - non alcoholic but very pleasant and refreshing.





Be sure to obtain permission from the landowner before harvesting fruit or sap for your booze!





Birch Sap Wine





Quite literally the main ingredient of this wine is the sap from a Birch tree – Silver Birch is best in my experience, but Downy Birch(and hybrids of the two) also work very well.





To harvest the sap, the ideal time is when the sap is rising in the Spring and the Birch leaves are “the size of a Field Mouse's ear”. Too early or too late and you will not get the flow of sap you need. When you get it right, you should be able to collect about 2.25litres or half a gallon per tree in a day. I do not like to take more than this from a single tree as it is the life blood of the tree after all, soI harvest from different trees and never the same tree two years' running, and never a tree less than 25cm diameter at 30cm above ground.





I use a brace and bit drill (a Scotch Eye Auger is another favourite tool) to drill into the tree at a slight upward angle about 1m or 3ft from the ground (or a bit less) and use a length of tube fitted with a wine-maker's demijohn cork with a central hole to let the sap rundown into a collecting bottle. I use a drill bit slightly narrower than the cork to make the hole, which only needs to penetrate a little under the outer bark, not into the “dead” wood of the tree core (1-2cm is normally right, depending on the tree). The cork provides a leak-proof fit.





Filling the neck of the collecting vessel with loose packed cotton wool keeps out insects and debris, but lets air through.





Once you have finished tapping your tree, carefully seal the wound in the bark. I use a sterilised solid cork bung meant for demijohns to prevent the tree from bleeding to death or becoming prone to fungal infections and other diseases.





If you do not have the basic wine-making kit or drill, you can harvest Birch sap by cutting a small hole with your knife, or the awlon your Swiss Army Knife, and wedge a twig in the hole to direct the sap into the collecting vessel. This tends to be less efficient and harder to plug after use.





Once you have collected your sap, boil it as soon as possible and store in sterilised bottles if you need to keep it for any time as it goes off very quickly.





Basic Wine-making Equipment





Bucket with tight fitting lid (plastic fermentation bucket)


Plastic hose


Demijohn (1 gallon or 4.5 litres)


Corks solid and holed to fit demijohn


Air locks


I can also recommend the book “First Steps in Wine making” by C JJ Berry to anyone wanting to start winemaking.


All equipment should be sterilised with boiling water or Campden Tablets before use or storage, to avoid things going horribly wrong!





For the wine you will need





Ingredients:


4.5litres or 1 gallon of Birch sap


200g or half a pound of finely chopped raisins


Juice of 2 large lemons


1kg or 2.25lb sugar (the flavour changes if you use white, Demerare or any other kind; try different types, though white is the standard)


General Purpose yeast.


​

Method:


Bring the sap to the boil and add sugar and simmer until the sugar is completely dissolved or about 10 minutes.


Put the raisins in the fermentation bucket and pour on the boiling sap and sugar. Add lemon juice.


Startthe yeast working as per the instructions on the packet and once the liquid is cooled to blood heat or 35-36 degrees C, add the yeast to the fermentation bucket. Cover the bucket and leave to work for 4days, then syphon or strain the liquid into a demijohn.





Seal demijohn with an airlock and leave it in a warm room or cupboard (an airing cupboard is commonly used) until it stops fermenting.





Rack the wine off (i.e. syphon the wine using a plastic tube so any sediment is left behind) into a clean demijohn until all the sediment has cleared and the wine is totally clear. This can take several months. Bottle the wine and leave it in a cool place (such as a frost-free garage) for at least a month and preferably around 6-12 months to mature before you enjoy it.





RosehipWine

​

Here is a little seasonal recipe that I have found simple to follow and gives very enjoyable results! This recipe provides something I would compare to a medium sherry.

​

INGREDIENTS​

2lb rosehips


2lb sugar


Juice of 1 lemon and 1 orange


1 gallon of water


Yeast (general purpose)


​

METHOD​

​

Carefully harvest the rosehips (the thorns are SHARP!) after the first frosts, wash them well and remove any old petals and stalks. Cut or crush the rosehips and put them and sugar into a lidded bucket.

Pour on the boiling water and stir well to dissolve the sugar. Use along stick or spoon and avoid contact with the irritating “hairs”of the rosehips.





When the mix is cool, add the lemon and orange juice and the yeast(follow instructions on the yeast packet).





Put the lid on the bucket and leave it in a warm place for 2 weeks.





Strain the mix through a fine jelly bag (or parachute silk) into a fermentation jar (demijohn) and fit an airlock.





When the wine is clear, siphon it into a fresh jar for 3 months before bottling. Leave for another 6 months before sampling for a more mature flavour.


​

Sloe Gin and Blackberry Vodka





Sloe Gin and Blackberry Vodka share the same basic recipe and method– just change the fruit and the spirit – and both are ideal winter warmers around the campfire.





Harvest the fruit when it is fully ripe and, for the sloes,preferably after a frost. I find freezing the fruit helps make it easy to handle and means it will not go off if you do not pick allyou need in one go. Take care when harvesting sloes – blackthorn can give you wounds that always seem to go horribly septic!





Both blackberries and sloes should be easily identifiable – the fruits of common bramble and blackthorn trees respectively. Use cheap spirits as the flavour comes from the fruit.





Ingredients


Fruit


Sugar


Spirits


Sealable jars


(All amounts are variable!)





Method


If you are using sloes, ***** or cut each one before putting in thejar.





Take your jar (old coffee jars are ideal) and half fill it with fruit. Tip the fruit out, weight it, return the fruit to the jar and add around half the weight of the fruit of sugar (try different types of sugar for subtle variations of final flavour). For example, if your half jar of fruit weighs 0.5kg, add 0.25kg of sugar.





Top the jar up with your chosen spirit and seal it tight.


Shake the jar vigorously every day until the sugar has all dissolved and then once a week for 3 months, then strain the fruit through fine fabric (muslin or parachute silk work well) and bottle it.





Return the fruit to the jars and top up with red wine. After a month strain off the fruit and bottle the wine, which is now a “Hedgerow Port”.





The blackberries left make a great pie filling or just put over icecream as a good dessert. I find the sloes not to my taste, but some like them in dark chocolate.





For a non-alcoholic drink, try Elderflower Cordial.





Ingredients


10-12 heads of elderflowers


1.5lb of sugar


1oz tartaric acid powder


2 finely chopped lemons


Half a gallon of boiling water.





Method


Put the elderflowers, sugar, tartaric acid and lemons into a large bowl or plastic bucket. Pour on the boiling water and stir well. Cover the bowl or bucket and leave in a cool place for 24 hours. Strain out the flowers and fruit through muslin and bottle.





The cordial can be used immediately, or stored for a short while, but can naturally ferment in the bottle.





Dilute with ice-cold flat or sparkling water for a refreshing summer drink.





BUSHCRAFT BOOZE


PHOTO CAPTIONS





1 Silver Birch


2 Tapping a Birch, drill method


3 Tapping a Birch, cut method


4 Plugging the tap


6 Blackberries


7 Blackberry Vodka


8 Blackberry Vodka


9 Sloes


10 Sloe Gin


11 Rosehips


12 Rosehips


13 Rosehip Wine


14 Basic winemaking kit


15 Wines and spirits


16 Elderflower Cordial

 

[John Fenna]

IMPROVISED CARRYING SOLUTIONS






To me, bushcraft is not all about picking up your kit from a shop and using the “latest and best” expensive kit, but also about experimenting with home-made, improvised, “traditional” and more“interesting” kit. I admit that I have a personal preference for avoiding synthetic materials in my kit, I love making things and this colours my bushcraft.





When it comes to carrying kit I like to look to the past and see how things were done when bushcraft skills, as we call them now, were the mainstream skills of the outdoorsman, so here I offer some thoughts on what you can improvise to carry your kit in if you do not want to use a modern, high-tech pack.





The word “rucksack” us from the German “rucken” for back, and“sack” for back, and the simplest rucksack is simply a bag worn on the back. The design I am showing here was used extensively around the world in the past and was the basis of the WW2 Russian Army issue rucksack.





Quite simply, it is a bag. In the past I have used coal sacks and stuffsacks of various sizes, but here I am using a lightweight canoeing drysack, or rucksack liner, and some cord. The thicker the cord used the less it will dig in, but no cord will be super-comfortable, so this kind of pack is not ideal for carrying large weights.





To turn the sack into a rucksack, simply take a length of cord and tie each end to the bottom corners of the sack. You can use pretty much any knot you like; clove hitch, round-turn-and-two-half hitches,slip knot etc, but to stop the knot sliding off the pack, put something like a pine cone, in the corners of the sack first.





Fill the sack with your intended load and close the top of the sack. You “lock” the top of the sack and make the cord into your shoulder straps by forming a clove hitch in the centre of the cord and dropping this over the closed “neck” of the sack.





Once you have adjusted the length of the cord to suit your body and the sack size, you have a simple rucksack. Try and pack soft items next to the body to protect your back from the hard items and you will find this a useful bit of kit.





I look to Australia for the next bit of improvised carrying kit –the “shiralee”, a simple bedroll carry.





In this example I am using a home-made blanket sleeping bag (with a home-made silk liner), but you could also use a standard sleeping bag or just a couple of blankets.





The method of making up a shiralee is simplicity itself. You simply lay out your sleeping bag or blankets on a ground sheet or tarp on the ground and roll up the kit you want to carry in the middle of it. Once it is neatly rolled you secure the roll and kit within it with two straps, each a quarter way in from the end. These straps can be buckled straps or just cord ties and not only stop your roll unrolling, but also stop your packed kit falling out, as well as being the attachment points for your shoulder strap or cord.





Well packed and worn on a wide shoulder-strap or thick cord diagonally across your back, the shiralee can be quite comfortable for medium loads.





If you pack most of your kit inside your bed roll and then lay it on your tarp or groundsheet, fold the sides of the tarp in over the bedroll before you roll it up to form the finished shiralee and your kit will be almost immersion proof.





For carrying any weight in reasonable comfort, the “Roycraft”pack is probably the simplest, most effective and best-known improvised bushcraft carrying solution.





This “A” frame pack can be made from almost any wood and lashed with any cordage from spruce roots through nettle cordage to paracord, but my preference is for using hazel lashed with 550paracord.





You need to cut three poles, all of about broomstick thickness, two of which should be as long as your arm from armpit to fingertip for the upright poles, and one from about elbow to fingertip to form the bottom bar. If you can find a suitably curved bottom bar, this can add comfort if lashed in place to hold the wood away from your back.





I like to round the end of each pole to avoid snags and about one to two finger-widths in from each end I cut in a “stop” to help secure lashings.





Lay the poles on the ground to form the A-shape of the frame and mark where the poles cross. I like one of the uprights to be a little longer than the other for hanging extra kit from, but generally you can have the top “prongs” protruding a couple of finger-widths to a hands-length beyond the crossing point, while the bottom bar can be two to four finger-widths beyond the cross point and the lower ends of the upright can protrude anything from two fingers to a hands-width below the bottom bar.





Once you have marked the points the poles cross, cut out saddle or lap joints in each pole so that once they are lashed in place there is no chance of the poles slipping.





I start by square lashing the lower joints, then diagonal lashing the top joint, pulling the lower lashings tight as I make the poles pull in to the top joint.





You can made your shoulder straps from pretty much anything from cord to custom padded or commercial rucksack shoulder straps.





In the photos you will see one Roycraft pack with grass and leaf-stuffed socks as shoulder straps and one with a webbing trouser belt as the shoulder straps. Both these versions are lashed to the top joint of the frame and have paracord loops added to their lower ends. These loops fit over the lower ends of the frame uprights and are knotted to give several length settings so you can adjust the fit of the pack.





To secure your load to the frame you could use something like the drybag rucksack as described earlier or fold your kit up into a square bundle a bit like the shiralee.





In the photos I have shown my kit carefully packed into a square bundle wrapped in my tarp, but whatever method used it is essential that a bulge of soft kit pushes through the centre gap of the pack and stops any hard items, or even the frame, rubbing against your back.





To lash the load to the frame I use my tarp ridgeline, start at the centre of the bottom bar and then first go up to the top joint, back to the bottom bar and then work side to side up the uprights.





Items such as a kipmat or axe that will not easily fit inside the bundle can be lashed on separately and small items that you may want during the day can be carried in a drybag rucksack or other haversack hung on top of the main bundle and tied down in a way to allow easy access.





For the ultimate DIY pack you could try making a Roycraft pack with basket made from brambles and cordage from willow or nettle!





IMPROVISEDCARRYING SOLUTIONS


PHOTOCAPTIONS





Drybag Pack


Drybag Rucksack 1


“ “ 2 clovehitchtop fastening


“ “ 3 slip knot lower fastening





Roycraft Pack


“ “ 1 the notched poles


“ “ 2 bottom joints lashed


“ “ 3 all joints lashed


“ “ 4 shoulderstraps from a webbing belt lashed on


“ “ 5 grassstuffed socks lashed on as shoulder strap


“ “ 6 theframe as worn


“ “ 7 thesock shoulder straps


“ “ 8 packingthe square bundle


“ “ 9 packthe bundle to exclude leaks


“ “ 10 fullyloaded frame side – note the bulge


“ “ 11 with a full load and ready to go


“ “ 12 a bramble built pack basket





Shiralee


“ 1 a simple waterproof shiralee


“ 2 a simple shiralee


“ 3 a shiralee


“ 4 the unrolled shiralee sleeping bag and groundsheet


​

 

[John Fenna]

There may be more to come....

 

[Pattree]

That is one for the bookmarker.
I haven’t got a fraction of the way though yet.

I want a lid for the top half of my M40. The one on Ebay fits the bottom pot of an M44.
I have just proofed a couple of tents and finished off 5L off Fabsil.
Guess who has enough steel plate to make a Fenna inspired lid!!!!