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Wednesday, February 15, 2012

No, A Flint And Steel Is NOT A Good Choice!

I recently wrote a post on the Traditional Flint and Steel (not to be confused with a fire steel). It was shared to a few survival message boards and actually became one of my all time top posts. Anytime anything is shared on a message board there is going to be drama and disagreements. People are going to point out all of your flaws, right down to grammar. This is why I hate message boards and rarely participate. While 90% of the users are great, helpful people, the other 10% are whiny, babies that have no idea what they are talking about!

I concluded my post by saying that the traditional flint and steel was a poor choice for a survival kit because it took skill to use and required char-cloth. In a survival emergency you need to be able to create a fire fast and easily. There was some disagreement on this.

During a recent winter storm I went in my backyard and tried to make a fire with a fire steel. Everyone agrees that making a fire with a fire steel is much easier than making one with a traditional flint and steel. You can watch the results:






It is hard to make a fire with anything in a winter storm. Why would you limit yourself to a flint and steel? Your life depends on it.

The guys that tried to say that a traditional flint and steel was a good choice argued that the flint could be fashioned into another tool and that you do not NEED to use char-cloth. While this is a true statement, I'll wager they have never tried to make a tool from a piece of flint or make a fire with a flint and steel without char-cloth. Both take immense skill. The average hunter, or even average outdoorsman could never do it in a survival situation.

I stand by my assessment.



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