DIY Fire Starter’s

[John_Mc]

The single easiest way to start a fire: make sure you are using properly dried/seasoned wood. It catches so much more easily than would that is only "almost dry enough" that you don't need anything fancy to get it started.

I use a single sheet of newspaper crumpled up with some well-dried pine kindling. If I have scraps of dimensional lumber from various projects, I'll split that up. Otherwise, I'll usually salvage a couple of rounds of White Pine from something that blew down on our property, split it small, then let it season properly. In a wood stove, I'll place a few well-dried medium sized firewood pieces in he back, then put 2 or three small sticks of kindling and crumpled up newspaper in front. Light the paper, leave the door open a crack, and it fires right up. Once the flame has spread well into the kindling, I shut the door, but leave the stove air supply wide open until the logs are burning well.

For camp fires at a camp ground, where I'm using the campground's firewood, their would is usually very poorly seasoned and harder to start. I'll use firestarters made by my daughter's Girl Scout troop: they save cardboard egg cartons and cut them into individual cups or the tiny "shot glass" sized paper cups, fill them with dryer lint or chainsaw wood chips and pour wax over them. They work rather well.

Another trick: if you are using a chainsaw on any pine or other softwood, make a few "noodling" cuts and save the noodles. They dry quickly if you get them up off the ground (even a week or so in good sun and wind if it's spread out and not just heaped in a big pile) and light easily. A fist full of noodles can make a great fire-starter.

If you are not familiar with "noodling": lay your chainsaw against the side of a log parallel to the grain and cut. You'll get long thin noodles, rather than chips. (On some saws, the noodles might eventually fill up the area around the drive sprocket. You can help clear this by occasionally lift i the saw slightly out of the cut as it runs to clear things. You can also control the length of the noodles by lifting up on the saw handle a bit, but keeping the end down in the log, so you are no longer completely parallel to the side of the log. The larger the angle, the shorter the chips.)

 

[EABill]

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.

We just use small pine branches if available. Less work. Out in the mountains in the Thorofare I used all small pine branches to start our fires. Just keep building with larger sticks. Simple.

 

[Treedoc]

Start with a large 1 gallon plastic container with a wide mouth. Fill 3/4 full with animal bed shavings. Add 1 cup of diesel. Shake it up real good to disperse the diesel. Poor out a heaping cup onto a paper plate. Set it where you want to build the fire, add kindling and set fire to the shavings. Use this method for both the wood stove and camping fires. Never fails.

 

[pmsmechanic]

Melt some wax, stir in as much sawdust as you can. Press it about 1.25" thick in a pan. When it's half hard cut into 1.25" squares and let harden. Each piece burns for about 20 minutes. I tried this idea with dryer lint but it burns to fast. I like the long burn time of sawdust.

 

[Hermio]

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.

Starters, not starter's. An apostrophe makes it possessive, not plural.

 

[Hermio]

I've been using leftover or discarded wax candles. Melt them in an old skillet and pour the wax about 3/4 inch thick in some kind of container. Add as much sawdust or wood shavings as the wax will absorb. When cool enough to handle break it apart into whatever size pieces you desire. Garage sales or GW Fashions (GoodWill) are good places to get large old candles for a quarter or two.
As mentioned above, pretty much any source of organic material can be used instead of sawdust. Paper, cotton balls, etc. After learning of this method I won't go back to using just newspapers and kindling. (That and the fact our local newspaper just quit.)

I have done that too, but I use small wax paper cups to press the hot sawdust mixture into. BTW, this whole thing is best done outdoors.

 

[Rockbadchild]

Starters, not starter's. An apostrophe makes it possessive, not plural.

wow seriously dud ??

 

[John_Mc]

Those of you using sawdust as one of your ingredients: are you actually using sawdust, like from a circular saw or table saw, or are you referring to the chips from using a chainsaw

 

[hunt4570]

The punctuation police have arrived!

 

[hunt4570]

Those of you using sawdust as one of your ingredients: are you actually using sawdust, like from a circular saw or table saw, or are you referring to the chips from using a chainsaw

Well if their chain is dull it might be sawdust!