Peanut Lighters?

L

lord_of_laziness

Joined
Jul 23, 2010
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21
What do you guys think about peanut lighters? For those who haven't seen one, they look like this:

sslight1large.jpg


I got one, and the lighter insert was always a little hard to get lit, and the wick got dirty and carbonized really fast. After a while, it would light after maybe 20+ spins of the sparker wheel. Now mine hardly has any wick, and until I can find a smoke shop to buy more lighter wick, this thing is out of commission. However, it's gotten a second lease on life because I've taken out the lighter insert and filled it with cardboard matches and a striker, which are a lot more reliable than the lighter insert ever was!

Have any of you had experience with peanut lighters? What do you think of them as a survival tool? And are yours any more reliable than mine? I'd like to think I got a lemon lighter, but I'm not too sure. For now, I personally wouldn't want to trust my life to one of these things.
 
i have had very similer problems with my insert. i think its the insert. if i am not mestaken there only like 3 or 4 brands that make the inserts for every peanut lighter i would say try the ones off of the county comm websight i have herd they work better. but good idea with the capsule
 
Glad to know it's not just me having problems with these things. Actually, I did get mine from County Comm. Honestly I think that lighters are one of those things that can only be made so small before they start to lose functionality. That being said, $10 or so isn't half bad for a watertight match case that's essentially indestructible.
 
There's a world of difference between simple and crude and these are crude. A mate of mine made one in jail from match sticks and a bit of mop and it worked just as well as the store bought brass one my brother had. And that's was not a good thing.
 
One thing I noticed with mine was the lighter gets dropped easy when your using it. Its small, almost to small to hold onto. As for the wick, it looks like a zippo wick would fit, or any cotton/wire one you could find for candlemaking or such. Those aren't too hard to find.
 
I replaced the crappy flint in mine with a new one from Ronson, and it made a world of difference. I've read that some of them have the wheel installed backwards, and this makes for hard striking too.

BB
 
Pretty much the same experience, with a country comm peanut. In short I'm not to impressed. In my opinion you are better off with a flint and steel and carry tender in a capsule the size of that peanut lighter.
 
beeperboy said:
I replaced the crappy flint in mine with a new one from Ronson, and it made a world of difference. I've read that some of them have the wheel installed backwards, and this makes for hard striking too.

BB
Click to expand...

Mirrors my experience. Try using the flint from a depleted Bic lighter (you have to smash the lighter to access it). They are generally longer than the stock flint and therefore the spring exerts more pressure, resulting in a stronger spark.

Coincidentally, yesterday I was in my chest of goodies, saw my peanut lighter, gave it a spin and it lit right away. Probably hasn't been used in 8-10 months or so. Speaks very well of the air-tight closure.
Doc
 
Wow, what happened there? I posted after Baldtaco and my post shows up before his. Also, it says that he posted at 12:35 pm today, and it currently is 11:20 am.????? :confused:

Doc

ETA, just happened again!!!!!!!!!!!! To prove my point:

Today, 12:35 PM
baldtaco-II
Registered User Join Date: Feb 2006
Posts: 2,602

There's a world of difference between simple and crude and these are crude. A mate of mine made one in jail from match sticks and a bit of mop and it worked just as well as the store bought brass one my brother had. And that's was not a good thing.
Click to expand...
 
man i carry a county comm mini. and its awesome. it keeps fuel forever and always sparks well. i guess i got lucky. the one down side is the lighter is very small and in the winter with gloves on it would be hard to operate

editted to ask the same thing as doc. this is weird. though for some reason his time stamp does say 12:35 where ours say 11:21
 
I got mine from Dealextreme for about $2. Fluid doesn't evaporate and it works every time. That said, I can't figure out why anyone would use one of these on a regular basis. They're too small to hold onto, and it's a pain to unscrew every time you want to use it. I sure wouldn't want to use it with shaking and stiff fingers. Mine is a back up to my back up to my back up. I expect that I'll never really need it and that I'll never have to replace the wick or flint. If I do, for $2, it might just be easier to buy a new one.

(Maybe the infrequency of use is the reason mine is still working okay.)
 
I had a county comm one and it didn't work at all. The flint would throw sparks but wouldn't catch the wick on fire. Tossed it. That being said my dad had one he bought a long time ago that was more of a bic in a capsule, that thing worked awesome.
 
i like my Windmill lighter.

about $30 for the standard one, a little more for the "delta" (armored) version.

and they're available in orange! :D

need to get another one for the BOB/GHB in the truck. right now mine is in my Camelbak MULE for day hikes and stuff.
 
I bought a couple to play with.

They are tiny, so needing to use them in emergency conditions is difficult. Wind, rain, snow, cold fingers all make them difficult to hold & fire-up.

They hold very little fuel. I am not convinced that the little rubber gasket will hold over time, especially as it is exposed to lighter fluid/white gas. It may seem to work now, but the one you've packed away for emergencies may be bone-dry the one time you really need it.

I think regular plastic Bics last almost forever, or you can pack a firesteel, or flint & tinder for just a little bit more space.
 
I bought one from County Comm and one from Going Gear. Both worked fine for me. I don't use them regularly because a bic is easier to use (actually a slider lighter), but do check them from time to time. I also got one of those metal matches and like it because you can stick the flame into tinder rather than trying to hold tinder over the small flame of the peanut lighter.

http://goinggear.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=5&products_id=514
 
If I was a smoker I wouldn't use the peanut lighter as my main lighter and when I go camping I take a butane lighter which I prefer. But I do keep a peanut lighter on me as an EDC emergency lighter. Every few months I'll top up the lighter fluid and test the lighter. For the way I use the peanut lighter I think it is just about perfect - I'd rather have the peanut lighter in an emergency survival situation than have to use a friction fire method. I like the peanut lighter, just not as a primary means of lighting a fire - as a small and easily carried backup fire lighting tool I can't think of anything else I would prefer to carry.
 
DOC-CANADA said:
Wow, what happened there? I posted after Baldtaco and my post shows up before his. Also, it says that he posted at 12:35 pm today, and it currently is 11:20 am.????? :confused:

Doc

ETA, just happened again!!!!!!!!!!!! To prove my point:
Click to expand...

That is weird, and no one seems to notice.....oooohhhh:eek:
 
I have one on my key ring but don't use it enough to have had problems so far. Since I don't smoke I carry it only for emergency use, and haven't had to rely on it on the trail yet.

A friend of mine, with a fair amount of experience of adventure travel, reckons that they are the only thing he has found which work consistently over a period of weeks under jungle conditions. He has used his in Borneo and was pleased with it when compared to the trouble he had with other means of firelighting. Apparently the continuous damp tended to corrode ferro rods and the flints in Bics while the fuel evaporated too fast from Zippo type lighters and matches just disintegrated.
 
I bought several about 5 years ago, great idea, poor quality. I got the countycomm ones, only about half worked, the o rings came off very easily, and now the o rings on ALL of them have dry rotted off. I wouldn't recommend them unless they come up with a more robust design.

They are a good idea.
 
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