I could be wrong, but I believe you can actually set fire to the smoke as it comes out the hole; when there isn't enough smoke left to burn, the char cloth is done.
We made a Coke Can alcohol stove at work last Friday that we used to make Char Cloth with...We tried both 70% and 90% rubbing alcohol(we had no isopropal stove alcohol at the time...) We cut up an old cotton t-shirt and wrapped the pieces in aluminum foil and stabbed a hole in the foil with my knife. Got a nice big flame blowing out of the cut!
Char Cloth is strange stuff...
made a small spark and it caught instantly...
The 1.5 inch squares we made urned very slowly with almost no heat, if left to themselves...
BUT....
When you blew on one of them, they produced so much heat that you had to move your hands and face away!
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