Tips on How to Start a Fire With Flint

If you want to build a fire without flint, there are a couple of things you should know. Lighting a fire the old fashioned way is a lot more difficult then it appears. It is a lot more then just throwing sparks on a pile of grass. However, fire is an essential if you are out in the wild.

If you are making a fire without matches and paper you are either demonstrating how it is done, are camping but forgot to pack matches, are practicing in case of an emergency situation, or are in an emergency situation. . If that is the case the first thing you should do is steady your nerves you do not want to make a mistake and hurt your hand. Now look around you for anything that will help.

Leaves and dry grasses do not catch on fire as easily as paper, but are the best thing to use that grows in the wild. To test and make sure that it is dry, bend it and see if it snaps. If it breaks quickly as you are bending it, then it is pretty dry. If you can find card board or some other flammable material use it in combination with the dry grasses. Also keep a lot of dry kindling and more grasses around before you start the fire, because you do not want to start one, run out of fuel, and have to start one again. Take the material and break it apart so that it becomes a loose pile with a lot of space for air to flow in and out. Now take out your flint and your striker. A striker is a piece of steal or another piece of fling if you are really desperate.

If you are in the wild and have a knife, you can use that as the striker. Just use the dull part so that you do not ruin the blade. A different item, such as an old bolt the back of a hatchet or any other thing made of iron that will not cut your hand.

Now hold the piece of flint right over the dried grass and other easily flammable things, or tinder, and strike it with the striker. You should see a bunch of sparks showering down. You will want to do this repeatedly, and as quick as you safely can. that way the most heat from the sparks will accumulate on the dry grass. Once the dry grass starts to smoke, carefully and gently blow air on it, and add more grass until a flame comes. Then add more grass and small twigs. Now slowly start building up to larger and larger sticks until you reach a large fire. Remember you do not want to make it to large, because it might become to hard too control.