DIY Emergency Fire Starter (Char Cloth)

before the discovery of matches and
other modern conveniences fires had to
be started in more primitive ways like
rubbing sticks together or burning wood
with a magnifying glass but anyone who’s
tried these methods knows it’s extremely
hard work to make a fire especially in
an emergency situation luckily there’s a
way to cheat and it’s called char cloth
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to get started on this project I’ll
sacrifice one of my little boy shirts
and a can of tuna
this shirt is 100% cotton and that’s
what we need so now we can focus on
prepping this can I’ll grab my wife’s
can opener and a small screwdriver and
get to work on removing the lid the lid
lifter cuts sideways and removes the top
portion of the lid just below the rim
and that’s perfect because we’ll want it
to fit back together later on okay the
tuna comes out and after a little
cleaning our char cloth maker is nearly
complete let’s cut off about four pieces
of shirt and lay them on the lid then
the bottom of the can fits over top to
finish we can punch a small hole in the
top with this screwdriver to act as a
vent hole to char this cloth properly
we’ll need to heat this up over 400
degrees Celsius and that can be done
with the solar scorcher it’s about 7:00
p.m. and the Sun is nearly set I found
the focal point and I’m happy to see
there still plenty of heat the little
flame shows that the cotton is charring
and releasing hydrogen and methane gases
through the hole in the top
all right the flame just went out so
that means it’s done and we’ll need to
carefully cover the hole with some
aluminum foil to prevent air from
leaking in and causing a flashback now
that it’s cooled down we can remove the
foil and the cover to see how our cloth
turned out it’s turned completely black
totally charred but not burned and
that’s just what we needed the fabrics
still pliable but now is extremely
sensitive to heat just a few seconds
with the Sun and a water bottle and we
can easily make a fire your water bottle
can also be used to make a fire without
the char cloth but it takes a lot longer
and is much more difficult okay so it’s
the next day and I’m making another
batch this time with an open flame this
method works super well it only takes
about 2 minutes to cook all the gasses
out of the fabric when it’s cooled down
and the foil is off I’m really impressed
at how much the fabric is shrunk from
the original size now I’m wondering if
cotton balls would work so my little boy
is helping load a batch and after 2
minutes in the fire they’re all done
they’re looking great and I’m interested
to see how they’ll compare to the cotton
fabric
to test the quality let’s brush the side
with a flame and blow gently to see if
it glows a success the fabric ignites
amazingly fast and burns impressively
slowly from this point all it takes to
get a flame is to add something
flammable like a piece of paper and blow
aha fire these charred cotton balls work
so well and are so cheap and accessible
that I think from now on I’m gonna use
them exclusively in my fire piston you
can see how to build this in a different
video I also tried making char cloth
using another fabric and a mint in a
glass baby food jar and an Altoids tin
overall I was most impressed with my
tuna can an open flame and handful of
cotton balls well there’s another item
for my emergency kit and a fun project
with my kids that’s it for now if you
liked this project perhaps you’ll like
some of my others check them out at the
king of random calm
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you