DIY Fire Starter’s

[MoBetta]

We were wondering, what are some of the ways that you guys are making your own fire starter’s. I tried small dried fir cones dipped in wax not good. Now using shredded paper stuffed into an ice tray with melted wax works good! Any other ideas? Thanks in advance for any ideas.

 

[Alan46]

My wife had this idea. Being a retired painting Contractor, I have plenty of paint thinner in my shop and an endless supply of Doug Fir cones laying around. She said let’s try soaking them in the thinner in a sealable glass jar, so we did and they work great without kindling!

 

[Tractorman46]

I am lazy and buy firelighters ("Zip" - small cubes) for speed and convenience. We have a modern boiler and heating system but also 2 wood burning stoves which in the winter we use everyday. Since we have several hectares of woodland the wood costs just chainsaw fuel and tractor diesel for hauling and splitting.
Reading through these posts I have not seen anything about lighting fires using the Swiss Method (or "upside down fire"). Sorry if I missed a post.
The method is quite different from that we learned as kids in the 1950s and in the Scouts. You put logs on the bottom and light the kindling on top. The fire burns smokeless from the top down. There are several videos you can find: this is just one

and once you've tried it you will be surprised how convenient it is. Less "tending" the fire to start with. Also I've found that in our stoves there's no need to cross stack the logs and it even works with just 1 or 2 layers laid parallel. You evolve your own style to match your stove or fireplace. I've used this method now for about 3 years. I was then 73 so, after nearly 70 years of lighting fires, how much time, effort and smoke it must have cost me before "seeing the light".
Give it a try.

 

[JsJs]

Can't believe ever one has missed this classic; saw dust soaked in used motor oil !

 

[FarmerJohn_2]

When we get frisky we take dryer lint and push it in egg cartons then drip melted wax on the top then cut those up, works GREAT

My go to is fat wood, buy it in huge quantity like HERE, they come in big pieces, take a hatchet and split them into pencil size pieces, take say 3 of those and light one and put them under some kindling then put firewood directly on top of that and you have a fire... as far as quantity and storage, one of those boxes fits in 3 of the christmas style popcorn tins and one box lasts me 3-4 years (they're cheaper in the off season)

The other dumb option is hand sanitizer, it's amazing what 3 squirts on some kindling will do , I found gallons of hand sanitizer at home depot clearance (it's crazy what they do once they're not required to supply it...) for $1 a gallon so I bought a bunch of that so I'm covered for years...

Dryer lint + wax in a paper/cardboard egg carton = 12-18 great fire starters. My wife and I are alone too, but she saves the lint every time she cleans the dryer filter. Then every month or so she makes me another batch of fire starters. I never run out.

"C'mon baby light my fire... "

 

[Cycledude]

Amazing 10 pages of ideas !
My home is mostly heated with wood, wood furnace is in the basement. House is on a hill so chimney usually has excellent draft so it’s pretty easy to light the fire, sometimes I resort to pouring a little used motor oil on the wood then the fire takes off very easy.
There really isn’t anything cheap about burning wood but it’s a very comfortable heat for a old poorly insulated house like mine. If I had known prices were going to go so crazy I would have built a new house years ago.

 

[Hoot Owl]

I use the cardboard egg cartons with wood shavings from my planer. Fill the cartons with wood then por melted candles over them. I have around 100 egg cartons in a foam cooler ready to go.

 

[Stephen D]

From my Boy Scout Days (can I say that without offending anyone?): We camped in rain most of the time, or at least it seemed that way. Our tried-and-true go-to was rolled up (and tied) corrugated cardboard dunked in wax. That would catch just about anything on fire.

 

[etpm]

I wish I could make a good copy of fatwood. I have a 5 gallon bucket full of fatwood splits that all came from a piece of a branch that was about 18 inches long and 6 inches in diameter. The wood was completely saturated with sap. The stuff burns hot and for a long time. I am going to be sad when I run out in a few years. It lights easily and is better than anything else I have ever used for starting fires volume wise. I use just a few pieces about 1/2 the diameter of a pencil and maybe 3 inches long to get a fire going. I have tried soaking wood in various flammable substances and nothing burns as long or hot. Maybe if I could tap a tree to get the sap, mix it with turpentine, soak some splits in, let the turpentine evaporate, then I would end up with some decent fatwood. I do have a fir stump that is still bleeding sap out of the end of stump. It has been weeping sap for 3 years now. I cut a thin layer off of the top of the stump once a year and fresh sap flows. I'm hoping the stump and roots are becoming saturated.
Eric

 

[Deanes]

We were wondering, what are some of the ways that you guys are making your own fire starter’s. I tried small dried fir cones dipped in wax not good. Now using shredded paper stuffed into an ice tray with melted wax works good! Any other ideas? Thanks in advance for any ideas.

I'm 77. Heated with wood stoves, and fireplaces, burned a lot of brush, burned a lot of trash. In all my life, I've never had the need for a prepared fire starter. Wadded-up junk mail is free and abundant every day. I will admit I've used a little diesel fuel on brush piles and some hand sanitizer on green wood in the stove.