The only items I carry around with me almost always are my metallic cigarette case "wallet", Underwater Kinetics 2xAAA flashlight (which I use as a key ring) and my cell phone (Nokia N-Gage). They are all a bit bulky, but I've grown fond of them over time.

Anyway, I was thinking that maybe there is some unused air space in the flashlight that could be used to store some miniaturized survival gear. The flashlight indeed has two empty spaces between the batteries that could probably fit:

• Two stormproof matchsticks and a striking surface or a custom made miniature magnesium flint wand
  
• A needle and some thread would probably fit in as well.
  

It's a watertight case by itself so the matchsticks would stay dry.

I wonder if you could fit a Micropur tablet or two in the bezel part?

N-Gage and many other cell phones have some empty space inside their cases. I opened up the case and noticed that the biggest continuous space is above the memory card. It's about the size of a stamp and perhaps a few millimeters high.

What would be the most useful small item that you could fit in such a minimal space? A Band aid? A Fishing hook?

Interesting idea. I don't have any suggestions yet, but I like the approach... Make containers you're going to be carrying anyway serve more than one purpose.

Someone on here just recently mentioned gluing lighter flints to a key blank for a stealthy, light weight fire steel. Maybe you could glue a slice from a larger fire steel to the outside or something.

Anyone know if you can get firesteel metal in rectangular blanks? I could glue flat plates of the stuff to all kinds of things...

Edit:

About the only other potentially useful items I can think of that might fit in such a small space... information and money. You could write down emergency contact info, calling card numbers, passwords, pins, etc. on small piece of paper and fold it around the batteries. The tender quick tabs for the sparklite fire starter (any tinder, really, I guess) can be squished into some odd spaces. Money and tinder also have the advantage that they probably won't get a second look from an xray person at an airport.

I would stick with matches; since it appears youre carrying no knife or other decent striker a ferrocerium (flint) rod wont do much good unless maybe you can strike a spark off a sharp edge on the cigarette case. You have definately made me look at my blackberry in a new light. If it didnt belong to my employer I would dismantle it right now to look for free space. <img src="/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Well, I do have a credit card size multitool that works well enough with a flint. I only recently added a few other components in a little bag, but I didn't really think it through. I just picked a few items from the lists and tried to fit in as much stuff as possible.

See EDC thread for a list of my current items

I'll probably drop the Stanley blade, safety pin, saw blade and add a compass. I'll experiment with the flashlight bezel part and see how that could be utilized. I'm pretty sure there is a way to fit in both a Micropur pill and a painkiller in that bezel somehow.

I bought some hot laminate pouches today.. I'll convert that anti-static bag with it's contents into a more rigid sealed plastic package that should also be more water proof and perhaps a bit thinner too.

If you are loooking for a miniture flint rod , check
out Ron and Karens place (hoods woods) survival.com
the small flints are a little longer than a AAA battery
you would probably have to cut a little of the end but it should work

HTH Yukon

I just took a look at your EDC in the other thread and I stand corrected. I appears you have a couple items that would probably make a good striker for a ferrocerium rod so I'd say you could absolutely go with that as long as your confident in your abilty to use it with the tinder that is available to you.

I carry a length of hacksaw blade in my phone's bettery compartment. Useful as a striker for the flint, and might be up to cutting through metal if you have plenty of time. At one time I carried a scaple blade there too, but I lost my nerve.

The needle and thread will serve as a compass, if you magnetise the needle.

Is it possible that magnetising the needle could have an ill effect on the phone? Do cell phones use magnetic media for data storage? If not then this is a great idea.

Many thanks for all the suggestions! Here's what I finally managed to fit in that flashlight:

• 2 Micropur pills
• 1 flat match
• 1 needle
• 1 striking surface
  

I'm not sure if the Micropur pills will stay good especially with the occasional extra warmth from the xenon bulb, but perhaps they are still better than nothing.

I also filed down a standard flint rod to make it fit in the cigarette case. The file section of the credit card sized multitool makes an excellent striker.

Be careful with that Micropur tablet, it could react with metals of the bulb assembly and corrode the whole thing.

Pete