So… I was thinking about alternative ways to start the fire. So I know that Potassium permanganate and antifreeze will act together and created spontaneous combustion. So obvious way would be to carry a vial of antifreeze and vial of Potassium permanganate. But I wanted to take it a step further. I would take glass tubing that is easy to seal (about one inch). I would seal one end with epoxy or just melt the ends shot over burner. I would pour antifreeze into it. Seal another end. I will take Potassium permanganate and crush it not into powder but fine crystals. Now I take my sealed tube and dip it into wax or simple glue, than roll the vial in the crystals. After everything dries I wrap cotton fibers around it or jam it into a predrilled hollow tampon. Now in order to make fire I just collect dry tinder and break the vial and leave it on top. It works on the similar principle as ammonia vials used to gain somebody’s consciousness. So what do you guys think?

Matt

It is the glicoze in antifreeze that reacts with potassium permanganate. So instead of carrying anti-freeze add some glycerine in your first-aid kit or a small amount in your EDC. You get a better result with glycerine instead of antifreeze and you can also use it for personal care.

Antifreeze is very harmful. The taste also is very sweet and attracts animals, if you have a pet be very careful with it they love the taste!

Burak

There may be easier to fabricate explosives - just search the net for the anarchists cookbook. I think that I remember that you can fabricate something equivalent to plastic explosives from household chemicals and spark it from something like the piezo element from a lighter.

Doesn't seem like something that I would want riding losely or tightly packed in my pocket survival kit though. Reminds me of this post .

where you will find this interesting piece of info

having glycerine in the vial sounds quite a good idea. i'd not try the home made plastic explosive if i were you, a friend of mine was working in his lab the other day and he destroyed his fumehood, and i do mean destroyed, all the glasswear the works, mind you he was doing a reaction on a multi litre scale. he didn't realise that the reaction he was doing made the said explosive, which is extreamly shock sensitive.

I presume that you will take precautions when you carry such a thing. But there are a few potential flaws. When you glue the crystals to the vial, you reduce the surface plus there might be too much glycerin. I`d pack the crystals and the vial into a small plastic bag and seal it. Wrapping or jamming the vial into cotton fibres might make ignition difficult. So it might be required to fluff it.

I had a similar idea in December : to keep permanganate crystals and a small bottle of glycerine in a PSK. Each product having different uses.
I bought permanganate in small bags (0.25g/bag) ; I tried to put a drop of glycerine on the crystals of 1 bag >>> nothing <img src="images/graemlins/confused.gif" alt="" />
I guess you need a larger amount of crystals to start a reaction.

Alain

For all that trouble couldn't you just get a small lighter or matches? Or am I missing something here?

Well the key word here was different methods...

Matt

sounds ok in theory.
have you actualy tried it yet?

This weakend will be my trial run.

Matt

Crush the PP till it becomes dust; then add glycerine.

Good luck

Ok it worked. I got so fired up that I couldn't wait until the weekend. So when I got home last night I started working on it. Got a gallon of antifreeze from my car and potassium permanganate and started "cooking". Sealed one end of the glass tube over the jet flame. Filled it with antifreeze thru a syringe. Sealed it with small rubber cork and dipped the end in wax. Used regular stick glue to smear all over the glass and I rolled it in Potassium permanganate making a big mess cuz of a glue water content. I also tried the same with wax which proved to be a cleaner method. So I left it to dry out and got to work on the tinder wrapping. Took four OB tampons and tried to make a hole in them. Lets say I wasted about 2 of them before I got it semi right. Than the hole was too small and crystals began to be scraped off when I tried to fit the tube in. So I made it bigger and decided to srink wrap the ends. After hour or so I had 4 starters. Time for the test. Broke one off and nothing happened. Left it on the side. Broke second one and this time it started bruning a little but it was more stink and smoke than fire. Thrid one I took out of the tampon which I fluffed to make a small craddle, than the foil that came with the tampon was used as another layer. I broke the tube and left it there. Antifreeze has no way to escape and it worked like a charm. Same went for the fourth one. Cleanup was horrible. So in conclusion it worked. Would I let my life depend on it? I think not. But it's good to know something like that exists and can be done. My roomate looked at me and said that it would make a good fuse for something or if I needed to start few fires in multiple locations. So it worked, it was fun, now everyone looks funny at my potassium permanganate stained hands. But when they were resting in Altoid tin they looked mighty cool <img src="images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Matt