Making fire
Encyclopedia
Fire
Fire is the rapid oxidation of a material in the chemical process of combustion, releasing heat, light, and various reaction products. Slower oxidative processes like rusting or digestion are not included by this definition....
was an essential tool in early human cultural development and still important today. Many different techniques for making fire (also called firemaking, firelighting or firecraft) exist. Smoldering plants and trees, or any source of hot coal
Coal
Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock usually occurring in rock strata in layers or veins called coal beds or coal seams. The harder forms, such as anthracite coal, can be regarded as metamorphic rock because of later exposure to elevated temperature and pressure...
s from natural fires is arguably the first experience humans had with controlling fire.
Fire by friction is the most commonly used method for making primitive fires. Ancient techniques for starting friction fires include the hand-drill, the bow drill
Bow drill
The bow drill is an ancient tool. While it was usually used to make fire, it was also used for primitive woodworking and dentistry. It consists of a bearing block or handhold, a spindle or drill, a hearth or fireboard, and a simple bow...
, the fire plough, the fire saw, and the pump drill. The flint and steel method was also used by primitive cultures. Steel or iron, when struck against any glassy stone such as quartz, jasper, agate or flint, will produce sparks. Sparks are caught onto suitable tinder
Tinder
Tinder is easily combustible material used to ignite fires by rudimentary methods. A small fire consisting of tinder is then used to ignite kindling. Anything that can be ignited by a match can be considered tinder; or by more rigorous definition, anything that begins to glow under a shower of...
and fanned into flames. A flint
Flint
Flint is a hard, sedimentary cryptocrystalline form of the mineral quartz, categorized as a variety of chert. It occurs chiefly as nodules and masses in sedimentary rocks, such as chalks and limestones. Inside the nodule, flint is usually dark grey, black, green, white, or brown in colour, and...
alone does not produce incandescent ember
Ember
Embers are the glowing, hot coals made of greatly heated wood, coal, or other carbon-based material that remain after, or sometimes precede a fire. Embers can glow very hot, sometimes as hot as the fire which created them...
s; it is the flint's ability to violently release small particles of iron, exposing them to oxygen that starts the burning. These methods have been known since the Paleolithic
Paleolithic
The Paleolithic Age, Era or Period, is a prehistoric period of human history distinguished by the development of the most primitive stone tools discovered , and covers roughly 99% of human technological prehistory...
ages, and are still commonly in use with certain 'primitive' tribes but difficult to use in a damp atmosphere. (The control of fire by early humans
Control of fire by early humans
The control of fire by early humans was a turning point in the cultural aspect of human evolution that allowed humans to cook food and obtain warmth and protection...
is said to date back to either Homo erectus
Homo erectus
Homo erectus is an extinct species of hominid that lived from the end of the Pliocene epoch to the later Pleistocene, about . The species originated in Africa and spread as far as India, China and Java. There is still disagreement on the subject of the classification, ancestry, and progeny of H...
or very early Homo sapiens, that is, hundreds of thousands of years ago, based on archaeological evidence of hearth
Hearth
In common historic and modern usage, a hearth is a brick- or stone-lined fireplace or oven often used for cooking and/or heating. For centuries, the hearth was considered an integral part of a home, often its central or most important feature...
s).
The skills required to create, control and use fire using primitive methods, often in a survival situation, have come into popular use as a component of bushcraft
Bushcraft
Bushcraft is a long-term extension of survival skills. A popular term for wilderness skills in Canada, The UK, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa, the term was popularised in the southern hemisphere by Les Hiddins in Australia as well as in the northern hemisphere by Mors Kochanski and...
.
Natural occurrence
Fire occurs naturally as a result of volcanic activity, meteorites, and lightning strikes. Many animals are aware of fire and adapt their behavior accordingly. Plants, too, have adapted to the natural occurrence of fire (Fire ecologyFire ecology
Fire ecology is concerned with the processes linking the natural incidence of fire in an ecosystem and the ecological effects of this fire. Many ecosystems, such as the North American prairie and chaparral ecosystems, and the South African savanna, have evolved with fire as a natural and necessary...
). Thus humans would have known about fire, and later its beneficial uses, long before the ability to make fire on demand was developed. In addition, the first and easiest way to make a fire would have been to use the hot ashes or burning wood from a forest or grass fire, and then to keep the fire or coals going for as long as possible by adding more wood and plant materials many times each day. Natural sources of animal fats and petrochemicals that burn could have been used to keep and maintain fires that started naturally.
The oldest way to make fire would have been to carry a burning coal around from a natural fire, and to keep it smoldering in dry plant material (such as white sage
White sage
Salvia apiana is an evergreen perennial shrub that is native to the southwestern United States and northwestern Mexico, found mainly in the coastal sage scrub habitat of Southern California and Baja California, on the western edges of the Mojave and Sonoran deserts.-Description :S...
or tobacco
Tobacco
Tobacco is an agricultural product processed from the leaves of plants in the genus Nicotiana. It can be consumed, used as a pesticide and, in the form of nicotine tartrate, used in some medicines...
) that can hold a burning coal for long periods of time. Dry tinder
Tinder
Tinder is easily combustible material used to ignite fires by rudimentary methods. A small fire consisting of tinder is then used to ignite kindling. Anything that can be ignited by a match can be considered tinder; or by more rigorous definition, anything that begins to glow under a shower of...
can be added to the coal, and then blown on to form flames. The problem with this method is that the coal can burn out, and the coal needs new plant material over long periods of time to keep smoldering. It may have been difficult to travel long distances in wet conditions with a burning coal wrapped in such plant materials. Many natives in North America still use certain smoldering plants to keep a fire alive for days. Birch
Birch
Birch is a tree or shrub of the genus Betula , in the family Betulaceae, closely related to the beech/oak family, Fagaceae. The Betula genus contains 30–60 known taxa...
bark, tobacco, sage, and other plants smolder very well and provide both smoke for insect repelling, and hot coals for fire making.
Friction
The hand drill is debated to be the oldest method of fire by friction, characterized by the use of a thin, straightened wooden shaft or reed to be spun with the handHand
A hand is a prehensile, multi-fingered extremity located at the end of an arm or forelimb of primates such as humans, chimpanzees, monkeys, and lemurs...
s, grinding within a notch against the soft wooden base of a fire board (A wooden board with a carved notch in which to catch heated wood fibers created by friction). This repetitive spinning and downward pressure causes black dust to form in the notch of the fireboard, eventually creating a hot, glowing coal
Coal
Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock usually occurring in rock strata in layers or veins called coal beds or coal seams. The harder forms, such as anthracite coal, can be regarded as metamorphic rock because of later exposure to elevated temperature and pressure...
. The coal is then carefully placed onto suitable tinder and fanned gently until flame is produced. It can take a great degree of practice and experience with many types of woods to discover a successful combination of materials. Softer woods are easier and should be learned before one attempts hardwood. However, fire can be made with any type of wood given the amount of experience an individual has.
The bow drill uses the same principle as the hand drill (friction by rotation of wood on wood), but the spindle is shorter, wider (about the size of your thumb) and driven by a bow, which allows longer strokes. With a well built bow-drill and enough practice, fire can be easily created even in wet conditions.
Another simple fire making tool using friction is a fire plow. It consists of a stick cut to a dull point, and a long piece of wood with a groove cut down its length. The point of the first piece is rubbed against the groove of the second piece in a "plowing" motion, rapidly, to produce hot dust that then becomes a coal. A split is often made down the length of the grooved piece, so that oxygen can flow freely to the coal/ember. Once hot enough, the coal is introduced to the tinder, more oxygen is added by blowing and the result is ignition.
A fire pump or pump drill is variant on the bow drill that uses a coiled rope around a cross-section of wooden stakes to produce friction on a hard surface, combusting material underneath the mechanism.
A fire saw is a method by which a piece of wood is sawed through a notch in a second piece or pieces to generate friction. The tinder may be placed between two slats of wood with the third piece or "saw" drawn over them above the tinder so as to catch a coal, but there is more than one configuration.
Pre-modern methods
To produce sparks, one may strike a hard stone, for example flintFlint
Flint is a hard, sedimentary cryptocrystalline form of the mineral quartz, categorized as a variety of chert. It occurs chiefly as nodules and masses in sedimentary rocks, such as chalks and limestones. Inside the nodule, flint is usually dark grey, black, green, white, or brown in colour, and...
or quartz, on another containing iron such as pyrite
Pyrite
The mineral pyrite, or iron pyrite, is an iron sulfide with the formula FeS2. This mineral's metallic luster and pale-to-normal, brass-yellow hue have earned it the nickname fool's gold because of its resemblance to gold...
or marcasite
Marcasite
The mineral marcasite, sometimes called white iron pyrite, is iron sulfide with orthorhombic crystal structure. It is physically and crystallographically distinct from pyrite, which is iron sulfide with cubic crystal structure. Both structures do have in common that they contain the disulfide...
. Sparks with this method must be immediately in contact with tinder, or with black charcoal cloth or steel wool that will smolder from the spark. The material used to hold the spark is held above the flint or quartz, tight against the stone. The striker is then brought against the stone in a quick, straight downward motion. The stone pulls steel flakes off the striker, which become hot, molten sparks. The use of flint in particular became the most common method of producing flames in pre-industrial societies. Travelers up to the late 19th century would often use tinderbox
Tinderbox
A tinderbox is a small container containing flint, firesteel, and tinder , used together to help kindle a fire....
es in order to start fires with a much greater ease than that of a bow drill or hand drill.
One of the easiest methods of creating fire is to use a lens
Lens (optics)
A lens is an optical device with perfect or approximate axial symmetry which transmits and refracts light, converging or diverging the beam. A simple lens consists of a single optical element...
or condensing reflector (such as a spotlight lantern reflector) to focus the energy from the sun onto tinder. It is most effective on dark coloured tinder which absorbs heat and light energy better (light coloured tinder reflects heat and light energy).
A concave mirror can be used to focus the sun's rays on some tinder as well, such as a polished soda can bottom.
An unusual method of making fire is by using a device called a fire piston
Fire piston
A fire piston, sometimes called a fire syringe, is a device of ancient origin which is used to kindle fire. It uses the principle of the heating of a gas by its rapid compression to ignite a piece of tinder, which is then used to set light to kindling.-Description and use:A fire piston consists...
. Commonly constructed from wood, horn or plastic, it is composed of a hollow tube with one sealed end and a piston which fits snugly within the tube. At the end of the piston is a depression where tinder is held during compression . The tinder is inserted into the depression, and the piston is quickly pushed into the tube. This compresses the air, raising the temperature in the tube, similarly to the way a diesel engine fires, to the point where the tinder ignites and forms an ember. Tinder can come from a variety of sources such as "Tinder Fungus" and char-cloth. This was observed in the jungle by Laurens van der Post
Laurens van der Post
Sir Laurens Jan van der Post, CBE was a 20th century Afrikaner author of many books, farmer, war hero, political adviser to British heads of government, close friend of Prince Charles, godfather of Prince William, educator, journalist, humanitarian, philosopher, explorer, and...
.
Modern methods
The invention of matchMatch
A match is a tool for starting a fire under controlled conditions. A typical modern match is made of a small wooden stick or stiff paper. One end is coated with a material that can be ignited by frictional heat generated by striking the match against a suitable surface...
es dates from the 19th century, when the tips of small wooden rods were coated with sulfur
Sulfur
Sulfur or sulphur is the chemical element with atomic number 16. In the periodic table it is represented by the symbol S. It is an abundant, multivalent non-metal. Under normal conditions, sulfur atoms form cyclic octatomic molecules with chemical formula S8. Elemental sulfur is a bright yellow...
or phosphorus
Phosphorus
Phosphorus is the chemical element that has the symbol P and atomic number 15. A multivalent nonmetal of the nitrogen group, phosphorus as a mineral is almost always present in its maximally oxidized state, as inorganic phosphate rocks...
, two naturally-occurring elements which are easily-combustible when combined with friction. The chemicals used in matches today are bound to the base by use of gelatin
Gelatin
Gelatin is a translucent, colorless, brittle , flavorless solid substance, derived from the collagen inside animals' skin and bones. It is commonly used as a gelling agent in food, pharmaceuticals, photography, and cosmetic manufacturing. Substances containing gelatin or functioning in a similar...
.
Lighter
Lighter
A lighter is a portable device used to generate a flame. It consists of a metal or plastic container filled with a flammable fluid or pressurized liquid gas, a means of ignition, and some provision for extinguishing the flame.- History :...
s, such as those for cigarettes or grills, combine ferrocerium
Ferrocerium
Ferrocerium is a man-made metallic material that has the ability to give off a large number of hot sparks at temperatures at when scraped against a rough surface , such as ridged steel...
with fuels such as butane
Butane
Butane is a gas with the formula C4H10 that is an alkane with four carbon atoms. The term may refer to any of two structural isomers, or to a mixture of them: in the IUPAC nomenclature, however, butane refers only to the unbranched n-butane isomer; the other one being called "methylpropane" or...
or ethane
Ethane
Ethane is a chemical compound with chemical formula C2H6. It is the only two-carbon alkane that is an aliphatic hydrocarbon. At standard temperature and pressure, ethane is a colorless, odorless gas....
, and can produce adjustable flames. They are also generally very simple to light, often implementing a wheel-mechanism which, when spun with the thumb, creates friction on an internal fragment of flint. Other lighters, such as those used to light grill
Grill (cooking)
A barbecue grill is a device for cooking food by applying heat directly from below. There are several varieties of such grills, with most falling into one of two categories: gas-fueled and charcoal. There is a great debate over the merits of charcoal or gas for use as the cooking method between...
s, most often only require the push of a button to produce a flame.
Electric firemaking involves the use of an object with a high electric resistance on tinder. A current is run through the object until it is red hot, much like the burners on an electric stove
Electric stove
An electric stove converts electricity into heat to cook and bake.- History :On September 20, 1859, George B. Simpson was awarded US patent #25532 for an 'electro-heater' surface heated by an platinum-wire coil powered by batteries; in his words, useful to "warm rooms, boil water, cook...
, and is brought into contact with the wood, lighting it. Also, a low electric current, such as a battery, coming in contact with a thin wire mesh (such as steel wool) will produce heat along the lines of charcloth which will also ignite with the proper tinder.
A gas flame may be ignited by a spark, typically generated by piezoelectricity
Piezoelectricity
Piezoelectricity is the charge which accumulates in certain solid materials in response to applied mechanical stress. The word piezoelectricity means electricity resulting from pressure...
. Other substances like flint, and metal alloys such as ferrocerium
Ferrocerium
Ferrocerium is a man-made metallic material that has the ability to give off a large number of hot sparks at temperatures at when scraped against a rough surface , such as ridged steel...
can be used to create hot sparks by mechanically scratching the material with a knife or sharp object. The resulting sparks can then be used to ignite man made or wild dry tinder. Some sparking devices using ferrocerium alloys contain high amounts of magnesium within the ferrocerium alloy resulting in much hotter sparks. And some also have a built-in striking blade which provides an easy method for sparking with one hand.
There are thousands of combinations of chemicals which will ignite when mixed together (some explosively). These are known as hypergolics. Chemical methods can produce poisonous or toxic waste.
Sustaining fire
Once the tinder is lit, it must be transferred to a larger tinder, such as a bundle of dried grass and then blown gently until a flame is created. Then it is necessary to put this lit bundle on the ground and then twigs or other small tinder be placed above it, then small branches and large twigs and so on until logs can be sustained in the fire. Most fires that fail are due to trying to shortstep the process of stepping up the size of the fire; one can't light a log with a match.It is important to increase the size of the wood slowly, as a small flame cannot heat a large mass enough to cause it to emit combustible gases. In addition, it is important to ensure a proper airflow to bring enough oxygen to the process without displacing the flame from the gases or cooling the fuel too much.
Once a fire is well underway, it is then possible to add fuels with more water or sap content as the heat may be enough to boil off the water. In wet weather, dry fuel can also be obtained by splitting dried out logs. Although the outside might be wet, the freshly split inner surfaces should be dry.