Fire building 101

One of the most commonly discussed skills in survival is fire-starting, but too often the actual building of a fire is overlooked. Don't get me wrong, I like using odd methods to get a fire going as much as the next wilderness buff, but if you get a flame going but have nowhere useful to put it, you'll end up doing all that hard work again.

I recommend practicing this at home to get to the point where you can start a fire in any condition and in short order. Pick a spot where you aren't likely to cause a fire to spread and ring it with rocks or bricks. Don't do this on a driveway as you can damage it with too much heat. You'll notice in the pictures below that I didn't ring the fire for ease of photographing only.

Prepare for the burn: Possibly the most crucial step is the one before you make the fire; gathering your materials. The rest is pretty easy if you get this down.

Fire building materials fall into a few basic areas:

Tinder - The stuff that starts to flame. Thinks small, thin stuff. Common tinders include cotton balls, wood shavings, thin bark and twigs, paper, artificial fire starters, dry pine needles, and leaves. I don't generally like leaves myself unless they are very dry. Below you'll see dryer lint in a toilet paper tube, and old Scouting favorite (if you mostly wear natural fabrics and don't stuff it too tightly)

Kindling- Once you get a flame going, you need something to catch and spread it. While the tinder is always smaller than @ 1/8", kindling goes from 1/4" to an inch. There should be a variety of sizes, generally 8-12" long, and as dry as possible. Some dampness can be dealt with here as the tinder will smoke it out, but dry is better while you get your skills tight. Kindling can be gathered as dry sticks, or split from a dry log, as shown here.

Fuel- Everything larger than kindling is fuel. This is the big stuff to be added after the fire is going BUT never too soon! More on that later.



Putting it up: Take a few pieces of fuel size logs and build a windscreen. I like to stack 2 logs on top of each other to form a log cabin style. This leaves room for wind to come in and give air to the fire. Remember, a fire needs ignition, fuel, and oxygen, so don't choke it.


If you're dealing with a windy day, you may want to put all 4 logs flat on the ground. For the rest of these pictures, I've removed these pieces for photographic reasons. Usually they will be some of the first wood to catch.
Now you need to build the heart of the fire. The overall structure is pretty straight forward. It is that of a teepee rather than a random pile. Start by placing the smallest tinder in the center of where the fire will go, then begin placing the larder tinder and kindling on it with one end on the ground and the other ends coming together into a cone. Stack it in a manner that you leave space and air between sticks, though not too much room. Do make sure to leave a small opening in the bottom to of the construction to allow your fire to be started. Now you have to decide how to start it.

Traditionally
A fire piston

Or using a more modern method
Weatherproof lighter

Light the tinder at the bottom of the fire:

You might need to blow on the fire a bit to get it too spread, but don't do so until you have a bit of flame going. A little blowing to spread the flame around the tinder can be a good thing, but if you have to do it too hard or much, you may not have placed enough tinder or small kindling in the middle of the fire. With practice you end up with something that becomes this!



Now you have fire! This is the time to start putting on some fuel. Small at first, then add to it. The easiest way is to lay a few pieces across the top of your initial log cabin to catch. As you build up coals, you should have little problem keeping it going. Just remember to put i tout when you're all done, and I mean VERY out. With my model fire burning for under 5 minutes, I stomped it out...



...dropped a few leaves on the remains and blew.


So you can see how forest fires start! Please make sure you can touch the remains of your fire without feeling any heat. Now, do it all over again till you get it down tight. Good luck!