Cliff Stamp
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- Oct 5, 1998
- Messages
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I did some burn testing on some egg carton fire starters. I made up batches that were a combination of just lint and wax, and some that had small bits of dried pine, and prepared them in several ways before the burning. Here is what I found out :
At the basic level there are two directions that you can take with the fire starters; a high volume of flame and a long lasting flame. What tends to increase one will decrease the other. Now you can obviously go in between on the various effects and thus get a medium class flame that burns for a medium length of time.
First off the wood chips were useless. Normal everyday dried lumber will burn out much faster than the wax, and will not catch nearly as easily as the lint. The small chips I was using (shavings) would be consumed in about 15 seconds once lit, and thus obviously isn't of much use when compared to the wax which an equal amount of will burn for minutes. In short, no real use. Note there are lots of high-resin woods that would be very valuable, then again you can use them on their own.
Poking holes in the egg cartons didn't seem to effect the burning at all. I did multiple runs with and without. I assumed that maybe the increased air flow would help, but it seems that it does just fine without and extra help in that area. In any case the sides of the carton catch fire readily and thus the exposed surface area jumps up readily. In short, no real use.
Slitting or just tearing the sides of the egg carton had a huge effect on burn time. The more you tear up the egg carton the more surface area becomes exposed and the faster it will catch on fire. You will thus increase the maximum flame and heat generated, but at the same time minimize the burn time as the fuel will obviously get used up quicker.
The amount of wax is very critical. At a basic level the more you put in the cartons the more fuel there is and thus the longer it will burn. However the more wax the more heat it takes to start the fire in the first place. The same thing goes for clumping. If you pile the wax in one place you get a slow burning low flame, if you spread it out you get a fast burning very large flame.
Lastly the position of the egg carton makes a significant effect. If you place it right side up you get a slow burning stable flame. if you turn it upside down then very quickly the entire carton will catch on fire and a very large flame will be produced as the wax is wicked into the cardboard. Obviously this will burn out rapidly.
So for maximum flame / heat :
-Use just a little wax well distributed through the lint, you can work this a little before lighting it. Spread the wax in layers, put on some lint, add some wax, repeat.
-Turn the carton upside down and light the exposed lint on the underside. A simple spark is enough to catch fire to the lint. The fire will burn up the cardboard far faster than down through it.
-Tear the edges of the carton into as many little strips as you can and move them away from the lint and wax. This will minimize the length of time it takes the carton to catch fire, super heat the wax and basically burst the whole thing into flames.
At a maximum I was getting a self supporting flame in under 30 s. This meant a flame that could not be blown out, the wind was decent, could not come close to lighting a match for example without cover. It was also fairly cold about -10 or so. At about 60 seconds there would be a very large flame about 4-6" in length. Once the fire had been going for one minute and thirty seconds the flames would be 6-8" in length. The heat was intense and caught on fire a pressure treated 2x4 that I was using as a fire box. By about three minutes the flames would have died down to about 2" and the flames would be out by five minutes. The core material was still very hot at this time and I could easily use it to ignite other egg cartons plus any manner of tinder material such as grass and the like.
For maximum burn time :
-Use a lot of wax and clump it together.
-Turn the carton right side up and light the exposed lint on top. You might have to work the lint to get enough exposed to super heat the wax before it will ignite.
-Leave the edges of the carton intact and keep them close to the lint.
At a minimum I was getting a self supporting flame in 30 s, however it frequently took longer up to about a minute for the longest one. These started very slow and had to be sheltered carefully and took a lot longer to build up. By about two minutes there would be a 2" flame, by three minutes it would be 4-6". At seven minutes it would still be going strong at about 3-4" in height. The open flame would continue for about 10 minutes in total. At this time the core material was still very hot at this time and I could easily use it to ignite other egg cartons plus any manner of tinder material such as grass and the like.
So there are lots of ways to build such a simple fire starter and you can radically effect the way it burns. I was using between one and two table spoons of wax per individual compartment. Going with more or less would allow even more extreme behavior than illustrated in the above. Experiment with them and have fun. I made some much larger ones and they would burn for much longer and were very robust, once they were going you could dump the contents out on wet grass and they would burn, dry out the grass and catch it on fire.
As with any experiments involving open flame, use a lot of care and make sure you can deal with any problems that might happen. They are also best done on a cold and wet day to minimize the probability of accidental fires. It also prepares you for the worse case scenarios anyway.
Some further experimentation was performed a few days later. This time instead of using wood as an alternative fuel I used hemp rope, cut up into small lengths and frayed apart, it will do this naturally once cut. I made up a dozen fire starters, some all lint and wax to use as controls, some a mixture of lint, hemp and wax, layered in both ways, and some just hemp and wax. This is what I found :
The hemp catches fire just as easy, if no easier than the wax meaning it will take a flame readily and as well generate enough heat to quickly melt the wax and catch it on fire. It will also burn much more uniformly, this I think is because its composition is much more consistent. Turning the fire starters upside down and tearing the sides I got burn times very close to the best times I had for the lint+wax slow burning. I had several hemp+wax burns that were 7-8 minutes. They would also create 4-6" flames much faster and would peak with a larger flame, 6-8", that also had a larger volume. In addition, once the flame had died out, pretty much the full volume of hemp would be left as hot embers, with the lint you would only be left with a cm cubed or less of ember.
Is there anything positive about the lint? Well yes, it does catch somewhat easier with a spark. I was able to light the hemp without difficulty, but the lint was simply easier. Both would generate a rapid flare up once lit. Based on this it would seem to me that the ideal fire starter has a heavy wax+hemp bottom, then you layer the hemp and wax, using less wax as you work towards the top, and finish with a decent amount of lint and just a little wax to hold it in place. The lint will catch readily and ignite the hemp. The flame will spread through the hemp melting and catching fire to the wax. Once the flame is at a maximum the bottom of the cardboard and all the extra wax will act as the main fuel source. You can easily get 4-8" flames for more than several minutes. I was able to use them for example to catch fire to 2x4" and greater size lumber in sub-zero weather.
In regards to water resistance, the wax helps a lot here in keeping the fire starter material from getting water logged. Testing the raw materials, the hemp was much easier to dry once saturated with water. Note on lint, not all of it is the same, the best burning stuff is very dense. Some of the more wiry material does not burn very well off of a spark.
-Cliff
At the basic level there are two directions that you can take with the fire starters; a high volume of flame and a long lasting flame. What tends to increase one will decrease the other. Now you can obviously go in between on the various effects and thus get a medium class flame that burns for a medium length of time.
First off the wood chips were useless. Normal everyday dried lumber will burn out much faster than the wax, and will not catch nearly as easily as the lint. The small chips I was using (shavings) would be consumed in about 15 seconds once lit, and thus obviously isn't of much use when compared to the wax which an equal amount of will burn for minutes. In short, no real use. Note there are lots of high-resin woods that would be very valuable, then again you can use them on their own.
Poking holes in the egg cartons didn't seem to effect the burning at all. I did multiple runs with and without. I assumed that maybe the increased air flow would help, but it seems that it does just fine without and extra help in that area. In any case the sides of the carton catch fire readily and thus the exposed surface area jumps up readily. In short, no real use.
Slitting or just tearing the sides of the egg carton had a huge effect on burn time. The more you tear up the egg carton the more surface area becomes exposed and the faster it will catch on fire. You will thus increase the maximum flame and heat generated, but at the same time minimize the burn time as the fuel will obviously get used up quicker.
The amount of wax is very critical. At a basic level the more you put in the cartons the more fuel there is and thus the longer it will burn. However the more wax the more heat it takes to start the fire in the first place. The same thing goes for clumping. If you pile the wax in one place you get a slow burning low flame, if you spread it out you get a fast burning very large flame.
Lastly the position of the egg carton makes a significant effect. If you place it right side up you get a slow burning stable flame. if you turn it upside down then very quickly the entire carton will catch on fire and a very large flame will be produced as the wax is wicked into the cardboard. Obviously this will burn out rapidly.
So for maximum flame / heat :
-Use just a little wax well distributed through the lint, you can work this a little before lighting it. Spread the wax in layers, put on some lint, add some wax, repeat.
-Turn the carton upside down and light the exposed lint on the underside. A simple spark is enough to catch fire to the lint. The fire will burn up the cardboard far faster than down through it.
-Tear the edges of the carton into as many little strips as you can and move them away from the lint and wax. This will minimize the length of time it takes the carton to catch fire, super heat the wax and basically burst the whole thing into flames.
At a maximum I was getting a self supporting flame in under 30 s. This meant a flame that could not be blown out, the wind was decent, could not come close to lighting a match for example without cover. It was also fairly cold about -10 or so. At about 60 seconds there would be a very large flame about 4-6" in length. Once the fire had been going for one minute and thirty seconds the flames would be 6-8" in length. The heat was intense and caught on fire a pressure treated 2x4 that I was using as a fire box. By about three minutes the flames would have died down to about 2" and the flames would be out by five minutes. The core material was still very hot at this time and I could easily use it to ignite other egg cartons plus any manner of tinder material such as grass and the like.
For maximum burn time :
-Use a lot of wax and clump it together.
-Turn the carton right side up and light the exposed lint on top. You might have to work the lint to get enough exposed to super heat the wax before it will ignite.
-Leave the edges of the carton intact and keep them close to the lint.
At a minimum I was getting a self supporting flame in 30 s, however it frequently took longer up to about a minute for the longest one. These started very slow and had to be sheltered carefully and took a lot longer to build up. By about two minutes there would be a 2" flame, by three minutes it would be 4-6". At seven minutes it would still be going strong at about 3-4" in height. The open flame would continue for about 10 minutes in total. At this time the core material was still very hot at this time and I could easily use it to ignite other egg cartons plus any manner of tinder material such as grass and the like.
So there are lots of ways to build such a simple fire starter and you can radically effect the way it burns. I was using between one and two table spoons of wax per individual compartment. Going with more or less would allow even more extreme behavior than illustrated in the above. Experiment with them and have fun. I made some much larger ones and they would burn for much longer and were very robust, once they were going you could dump the contents out on wet grass and they would burn, dry out the grass and catch it on fire.
As with any experiments involving open flame, use a lot of care and make sure you can deal with any problems that might happen. They are also best done on a cold and wet day to minimize the probability of accidental fires. It also prepares you for the worse case scenarios anyway.
Some further experimentation was performed a few days later. This time instead of using wood as an alternative fuel I used hemp rope, cut up into small lengths and frayed apart, it will do this naturally once cut. I made up a dozen fire starters, some all lint and wax to use as controls, some a mixture of lint, hemp and wax, layered in both ways, and some just hemp and wax. This is what I found :
The hemp catches fire just as easy, if no easier than the wax meaning it will take a flame readily and as well generate enough heat to quickly melt the wax and catch it on fire. It will also burn much more uniformly, this I think is because its composition is much more consistent. Turning the fire starters upside down and tearing the sides I got burn times very close to the best times I had for the lint+wax slow burning. I had several hemp+wax burns that were 7-8 minutes. They would also create 4-6" flames much faster and would peak with a larger flame, 6-8", that also had a larger volume. In addition, once the flame had died out, pretty much the full volume of hemp would be left as hot embers, with the lint you would only be left with a cm cubed or less of ember.
Is there anything positive about the lint? Well yes, it does catch somewhat easier with a spark. I was able to light the hemp without difficulty, but the lint was simply easier. Both would generate a rapid flare up once lit. Based on this it would seem to me that the ideal fire starter has a heavy wax+hemp bottom, then you layer the hemp and wax, using less wax as you work towards the top, and finish with a decent amount of lint and just a little wax to hold it in place. The lint will catch readily and ignite the hemp. The flame will spread through the hemp melting and catching fire to the wax. Once the flame is at a maximum the bottom of the cardboard and all the extra wax will act as the main fuel source. You can easily get 4-8" flames for more than several minutes. I was able to use them for example to catch fire to 2x4" and greater size lumber in sub-zero weather.
In regards to water resistance, the wax helps a lot here in keeping the fire starter material from getting water logged. Testing the raw materials, the hemp was much easier to dry once saturated with water. Note on lint, not all of it is the same, the best burning stuff is very dense. Some of the more wiry material does not burn very well off of a spark.
-Cliff
