A Well-Packed Flint and Steel Kit

Utilizing flint and steel is a very old way of making a fire. The method developed during the Iron Age in Europe about 500 BC. It was used until the 19th century in America and Europe when matches finally replaced them. This method of fire starting is based on percussion. Even earlier forms of percussion fires utilized iron pyrites instead of the steel. Considering the Iron Age began around 1200 BC, and I’m not a historian — I’m just guesstimating how long the actual flint and steel fire making has been around. I read that it started around 500 BC, and since I wasn’t there to see it for myself — I’m just going to take someone else’s word for it.

I’m not here to debate when it all started. I’m here to show you my particular flint and steel kit. I use a Hudson’s Bay tinder box. It has a burning lens built into the cover, so on a sunny day I can focus sunlight on a piece of tinder to get my campfire lit.

The inside of the box showing the glass under the outer cap.

I usually snag a small hank of jute twine from a craft store. It’s pretty inexpensive. Tow wads from the flax plant is a by product of linen cloth, and it’s an even finer fiber and makes for a really good tinder as well.

I cut off a short section and begin unraveling it.

I tease out the individual strands.

Then fluff the strands out to make a “bird nest” of the fibers.

The wad of broken down fibers is stuffed into the bottom of the tinder box. I also pack some slivers of fatwood on top of this. Fatwood is from pine trees that have fallen over but don’t lay on the ground and rot. The pine sap inside slowly turns into an extremely flammable resin in the wood. It has a sticky sweet smell to it, and when burning, it puts out a thick black oily smoke. Fatwood — or pitch pine as it’s sometimes called — will burn even went it gets extremely wet. Dampness doesn’t seem to have any effect. This stuff is awesome when getting a campfire going in driving rain or really wet conditions.

Rounding off the packing list is a C style fire steel, a small ziplock style mini baggie with char cloth, and a smaller piece of fairly sharp flint to strike a spark. Later on I’ll cover how to use a flint and steel striker to ignite your char cloth. These older fire starting methods work pretty well and are quick to light. Unlike a cigarette lighter, they require no gas or liquid fuels that can dry up and evaporate.