I bought a box of the sawdust/wax starters a year or two ago at the year-end clearance sale at the Depot. Cost a couple bucks. My wife used one or two of them; we still have most of the box left. It is so easy to pick up pine cones and save whatever resin-soaked pine we come across during splitting that I just haven't had any need for them
I used a firestarter each day to get the 55g drum stove in the warming hut lit. One match fires each day. Nice and warm. Love it.
I didn't think it was possible to not live near a Walmart! I live in the country and 3 or 4 I can get to in about 1/2 hr.!
Personally if I were to make them I would melt the wax in a double boiler for safety reasons.. I buy SC's 100 at a time for $75.00 and score them into 1/8ths so this gives me 800 fires.. Most of the time 1/8th is enough to start a fire.. My daughter is a GS leader and they use dryer lint with wax.. This works well too..
I couldn’t remember who it was that helped me think of this idea. Maybe I’ll look through this very thread and find my answer but whomever I “stole” the idea from, I appreciate you for doing it. Also inviting Midwinter to see what I was telling her about while keeping threads alive as well. Anyhow I took the Forstner bit to this block of fatwood, about the size of a box of screws. 1 inch bit and had at it. You can tell I drilled in a bit of the block but the amount of shavings here doesn’t show all of it as I’ve been drilling the same block a little at a time. This will just likely be chopped at and made for throwing on the hot coals to help start. The smell is like limes or some citrus mixture. Just my average project size. Prior to this I was making sawdust and wax mixed cups, using them currently and I go back and forth since they serve that purpose. I just love that I can play around with the scheme. The downside to this is since the fatwood is so darned sticky, I have to put this bit in a rubbing alcohol bath. The size of the bit really doesn’t matter so much but to go slow is key for those cool spiral shaves. Plus the pliability of the fresh fatwood helps compacting work into those 2 oz cups. Cash and carry sells them for a 250 count box for about $3, that’s such a decent price that I’ll take that over the free newspaper. Why? You can spend pennies on a more efficient system. I still got my fatwood for somewhat free.
At work they ship our product on skids with triangular bracing on to either side. They use wood for shims, it's about 3/4" thick and 6" wide by about 24" long. Mix of oak and pine, mostly oak. I cut them into 6-8" sections, them split them lengthwise with a hatchet into 2-3" pieces. Then I stack them like a log cabin, 3 layers of oak, then two of pine. Hit them with the propane torch and they're burning good in about 30 seconds. Place a few softwood splits on top once it's going good.
I believe it was me. I used a 2" forster bit and turned a piece of white cedar fence post into Swiss cheese. Drilling it in a box kept the chips contained nicely. They burned great just the chips alone without wax.
I'm not sure this is safe or recommended I'm just telling you what I do. Save all your wine corks and cut them in half. Find a large glass container, pickle jar chili jar, dump the corks in. Pour in the alcohol and let the corks absorb the liquid. It only takes a few to get the fire going. Keep the jar far away from the stove.
Ive heard of this one. I wanted to try it but i kept running into those plastic foam corks instead of real cork. But next time I come upon corks in cheap and bulk, why not?
How kind of you but no wife love. Just took this idea and ran with it. If you find a pine tree that’s been cut within about a foot or so off the ground and hasn’t rotted away, kick it and if it’s sounding like a rock, you’re in luck. Other times pine boughs that have been cut away and left with about 6”-12” from the tree will yield this. Cut only a flourishing pine and it’s gonna take some time. Otherwise Id mail a heap of this stuff to ya.
Hi guys please excuse my ignorance but what is an SC not something i have heard of here in Australia but i really like the wax fire starters got to make some probably could have just put the candles outside the last couple of days would have melted straight up
Happy to clear this up. I believe they were talking about the State of South Carolina as it is hotly known for its pines groves. Many a knot found here will start a fire, quicker than lightning. In fact the fatwood as it’s often called could be somewhat explosive as it pops and crackles from a stick that is not much bigger than the handle on your mothers soup spoon. Georgia in the US is an even better source for this... but honestly it can be any pine but this is what scares me about those fires in a chimney, the resin. Dry and all is ok but hitting a pocket of this stuff in a split usually has huge black smoke signals and it just tends to burn extremely out of control. So small amounts are really key.
