Primitive Archer

Main Discussion Area => Primitive Skills => Topic started by: paulc on January 07, 2020, 10:17:57 am

Title: friction fire gear....?
Post by: paulc on January 07, 2020, 10:17:57 am

Somewhere in here is a thread about fire drills using golden rod as the drill.  The pic is what I call golden rod-same stuff as what you all would be using?  And how big of a shaft is too big?  Or too small?

Thanks, Paul

Title: Re: friction fire gear....?
Post by: Outbackbob48 on January 07, 2020, 02:25:19 pm

Paulc, there lots of goldenrod species, I have been successful using what we call giant goldenrod, My personal experience when picking golden rod is to go big as they seem to shrink a lot while drying. As a rule of thumb you want  your spindle to be about size of your little finger or roughly 3/8 to 5/8 " dia. when dry. I like length to be finger tips to arm pit to start, Golden rod worked pretty good for handrill fire but my favorite is horseweed. Hope this helps. Bob

Title: Re: friction fire gear....?
Post by: paulc on January 07, 2020, 02:59:02 pm

Thanks Bob...not sure we have horseweed around here so golden rod may have to do... :-)