Charcloth is a superb tinder for catching a spark
If you would prefer to watch a video covering this process
please scroll to the bottom of this article
Charcloth is cotton/denim that has been burnt without oxygen. Char cloth can then be stored and later used as a great tinder for catching the weakest of sparks, it easily catches a spark and will glow steadily allowing you to catch more tinder materials and get your fire going. This makes char cloth a perfect companion to go with a flint and steel or firesteel set.
- Cotton & Denim work great.
- Metal Container
- High Heat, camp-fire embers work great, you could even use your cooker hob, however I wouldnt recommend it with the smell & smoke!
So far I have only needed to make small amounts of charcloth, so I have used a small tin. As you can see to the left I use a .22 air-pellet tin. Note the small hole in the lid of the tin, this is required to allow gases and smoke to be released when burning the cloth inside. But don't make your hole too large, we don't want lots of oxygen getting in there. If you wanted to char a larger batch of cloth in one go you can use a larger tin like a coffee tin etc.
As for the choice of cloth you can experiment with different materials and see what results you get. I have used old t-shirts, dusters, socks and jeans. I have had the best results with denim/jeans, It catches the spark very well.
Cut your material into manageable pieces to suit the size of your tin, I usually fit two or three squares in this small tin. Pack your material quite tightly, you want to minimise the pockets of air-space between the material to prevent the material catching light (flaming). If you are using a larger tin and more material in one go you will have to burn for longer in order to char all the material.
Screw on the lid tightly and get ready to do a controlled burn!
For the heat you can use the hot embers of your camp fire, or a BBQ after you've eaten. You can have small flames licking the tin but you don't really want flames encasing the thing. With my small tin I typically burn for just a few minutes the trick is to watch the small hole in your lid, you should see smoke pluming out, but you don't want flame as this means to much air is getting inside and the material will be consumed to much. Watch the hole and smoke and wait for a reduction in smoke, when this happens take the tin off the heat and close the hole with a stick or coin.
Let the container cool and then open to see your charcloth. Your Charcloth can now be stored in a tinderbox in your sack, keeping it dry and ready for later use. You might want to try out your Charcloth to check its Char'd enough, ideally it should be entirely black as shown on the right.
So your saying you've been doing it for years in a sealed sweet tin and you've never had it pop open and ruin your batch of Charcloth?
Keep up the great work guys.
George.
Me and my cousin got caught in the rain last night, tried making a fire but sadly had to attempt it twice. If we had something like this with us we could have managed it first time I'm pretty confident.
Thank you for sharing this knowledge.
Awesome video too
In response to a few comments above, In the years I've been leading the team, I can honestly say that using a lighter is a hell of a lot easier.
But when you're out of gas, or when the rain has soaked the mechanism through, at least you can still keep warm with a simple application of knowledge.
You make the Firesteel sound inferior to a lighter by saying why bother carrying a firesteel, just carry a lighter, your failing to realise that a firesteel is more robust and versatile than a lighter. A firesteel works when wet, it's not easily crushed, cracked or damaged like a lighter, a Firesteel can light tens of thousands of fire way beyond point of which your lighter ran out.
You also assume that one could simply not bother carrying these fire-making tools at all and you say about using flint and iron assuming you can find it. Well flint is a scare resource round Cornwall and very hard to find. If I had to rely on making fire myself in the wilds I would do it with wood and fire by friction.
"...save all the bother and just light the dry grass with the lighter." - When you know what your doing you can light a fire faster by spark than most people can with a lighter!