Sulphur Matches from scratch Part 1

[tombear]

Related to matches and dips I've just stumbled on this wonderful site. I know its all old hat to those north of the Wall but I'd never heard of

http://www.abdn.ac.uk/virtualmuseum...w=true&mt=&sign=&viewnumber=&resultsperpage=9

http://www.abdn.ac.uk/virtualmuseum...w=true&mt=&sign=&viewnumber=&resultsperpage=9

and

http://www.abdn.ac.uk/virtualmuseum...w=true&mt=&sign=&viewnumber=&resultsperpage=9

All new to a Saxon like me!

Any of you had experiance of using them? would suspending them in the chimney coat them in tar as well?

ATB

Tom

 

[Toddy]

These were common place for millenia.
Evidence for pine candles was found during excavations on the Oakbank crannog on Loch Tay (c500bce).
They burn for about 20 minutes or so. Give a good clear light, and they smell good

Cruisie's on the other hand burned any oil that could be obtained, usually fish. Did you know that a massive proportion of the whales ever hunted and rendered were done so to provide lamp oil ? Margarine and the like came much later.

The puirman (no clothes ) was a multifunctional stand. Basically it securely held almost any kind of lighting material. Very practical really

cheers,
M

 

[tombear]

Cheers!

Well, guess what I will be making in the near future when i can find some suitable wood!

I may cheat and make some from Maya wood when I get home first, see how well it splits.

ATB

Tom

Silly and non PC question but can you get whale oil any more and if not, can you buy fish oil (cod liver oil?) suitable for burning. I draw the line at makinbg my own!

 

[tombear]

Before it started to lightly rain and while by the lack of cars the neighbours were away I managed to dip the sulphur matches I cut a few days back.

I made 420 double ended 5 inchers and from the snapped ( Lots of knots, I used some scrap pine bed boards ) 25 odd under 3.5 inchers to go in the smaller of the two oak dugout hearth tinder boxes I bodged. Should last us. The tips will go a pale yellow over time. I've tied them in bundles of 20 for convenience

Next time we have a fire we will restock the charcloth store.

atb

Tom

 

[tombear]

Just a note on sulphur to add. Found a interesting article on sulphur, about half way down there's info on in liquid state.

http://sulphur.atomistry.com/allotropy.html

Basically the state you want the sulphur to be in for getting a nice thin layer when you dip is its most funny. At 160 C a change occurs when the liquid starts to thicken up, luckily for people without one of those neat electronic gadgets for reading temperatures at a distance ( I so want one! ) there is a colour change that starts at that temp, it starts to change from pale yellow to increasingly dark brown. If it starts to change colour reduce the heat but if I've read it right don't cool it down quickly or it will keep the darker colour.

ATB

Tom

 

[petrochemicals]

Are they the sort you can light off your trousers or the more modern sort of needing sandpaper ?

 

[Robson Valley]

Friction match heads are ideal for IED pipe bombs.

Friction match heads can be ignited by the gnawing action of a mouse.
Taught as a kid that matches had to be kept in some sort of closed tin.

Not hard to make, despite the risk. Just learn to keep your efforts really spread out.
Piles of matches and piles of components is really bad form, as noted above.

Modern strike matches have one of the chemical components on the box strip (phosphorus?)

 

[tombear]

Neither, they are the sort lit from a ember made on your char from a flint and steel, fell out of use from the mid 19 th century as strike anywhere matches became freely available.

ATB

Tom

 

[Robson Valley]

Thanks. I've just read the Wikipedia online entry for "match."
Amazing how much stumbling around had to happen in the research end of things.
Of course, their understanding of chemistry was only as good as that day and time.

Hard to imagine the performance to light a pipe of tobacco!

 

[Leshy]

I personally had never heard of it until yesterday , le loup in this parish posted a series of videos on flint and steel methods and those matches caught my attention.
What a brilliant , obvious solution to lighting a lamp or candles in the days when stone and steel was the method of choice.
From ember to flame on a stick!
Brilliant and I'll be trying this soon .
Thanks Tom for all this info and for resuscitating this thread too as I never saw it first time around.
👍

 

[tombear]

Aye , at some point I'll get myself a nice set of ember tongs for lighting the briars and only smoke when there's a fire going. Much more civilised!

Leshy If you only want a bit of sulphur and don't want the hassle of getting it by post most pet shops sell it as a supplement for dogs, you put it in their water bowls or some such.

https://www.viovet.co.uk/Hatchwells..._find=117899&gclid=CJDz4afdwc8CFWYq0wodCxsC7A

Sort of thing. I'm told garden centres have it but personally I pass more pet shops than those.

Sad to say I still want to get some raw Icelandic sulphur like the old Hansetic League shipped into Hull etc back in the day.

ATB

Tom

 

[Trotsky]

I think I'll be having a go at making some of these myself, I've no shortage of wood suitable for splitting like that. Seems the perfect thing to keep in the waterproof stash box I recently got in with another buy. I also have, somewhere in a drawer, one of those infrared thermometers (came from lidl) so I can find that 160°C sweet spot. Now just to source some sulphur.
Thanks for sharing!

 

[Leshy]

Thanks Tom , thats awesome.
I hadn't even thought about how difficult it would be to source sulphur.
That sounds perfect.

I'm sure I'm not alone in this but...
More and more I'm finding myself moving on from Bushcraft and actually really getting into ancient and/or medieval stuff...
Methods, materials, food, tools, technology, it all just seems so beautifully crafted and so practical and much more gratifying to use and work with.
Am I a closet "reenactment" nut????

😁 LMAO

These "spunks" are definitely topping the "to do" list ...
Cheers for the info

 

[Robson Valley]

Tom runs a Time Machine. Watch long enough and he can snap us all back for centuries.
I've heard the words which describe these and other sorts of fire-lighters.
To actually see them made, (what a lot of fuss to stop for pictures) is extraordinary.

I'm sure that I saw a sulfur melting pot like the picture. The top slopes in like part of a funnel.
The drawing loos so familiar but I cannot place it yet. Loooooong ago.

 

[tombear]

I wouldn't say sulphurs hard to get just its easiest to get from the pet shops in the small amounts you need. While you're there it's worth looking to see if they stock clean large bones I case you need them, in future, for making out some do others have ones not as suitable. Only other thing from them I've had for making is the giant dog chews for the raw hide.

im now in two minds about those tins with the sloping insides, I think they may be for fumigating with sulphur the wide base so it can be plopped on top of a brazier and not fall over in general ( in match making you watch it constantly ) and the sloping insides to stop it boiling over the sides and the smoke would be in a plume out of the centre. It's only at the Anne of Cleaves house or where ever it is they have labelled it as a sulphur match dipping pot. From having done it a few times you want to be able to see inside better and there's no need for the sloping in side bits I can see. They would just get in the way and make tipping out the contents very hard. Presumably if you were fumigating ( or bleaching cloth, sulphurs other big use back in the day ) you put in the required amount, set it to the heat source and retreated to a safe distance until it's finished. No need to empty it unlike if you've overcooked the sulphur and it's become less than optimum for making matches.

atb

tom