A few days in another thread, I posted about some egg carton and candle wax fire tinders that I make. Off forum it was requested if I could show them here. I created a batch today so here goes.

The actual work time was less then 15 minutes, with multiple photo taking, it stretched to 35 minutes.

Start with old candle wax pieces, an egg carton, wooden matches, string, and some wood shavings, sawdust etc. I ended up using 3 cans of wax and roughly 2x the amount of wood shavings then shown here.


While the candle wax is melting, add some wood shavings into the egg carton. Break the wooden matches into 2-3 pieces and also add to the egg carton....no sense wasting them.


Once the wax is melted, dip the string in and let sit for a minute or two.


Repeat this process one more time and let the wax harden.


Pour the wax over the egg carton.


Continue pouring the wax until the carton is just about filled.


Add some more wood shavings. The match ends also need to be dipped a couple of times into the wax.


Let the wax harden slightly then stick 2 match ends in each compartment. Even though it is not really needed (I added as another possible option) the waxed string from above can also be cut into pieces and added as wick to each egg compartment.


Let harden for awhile then break the egg carton into 12 pieces.


As you can see, the wax does good job of finding coating the cardboard and also serves to make the cardboard more water resistant and allows for easier re-lighting when wet....more on this in Part II

Cool write-up

thanks - fun project!

i've seen that in the old camping books.some of the old tricks are the best ones..i don't want to highjack your post but whats more important in your part of the country..fire or water?? for me it's fire,if i can make one %50 of my survival problems are solved.

Thats a good question and has two answers.

In less then an hour drive east or north, we can be deep into the mountains that have never seen a human and has no shortage of water....so in this case, it would be fire.

Yet drive an hour north and slightly west, which is our fav area for outdoor activities in the summer. It will be water as this area is almost desert like and has the hottest summer temps in Canada.

Back to the egg carton tinder. I don't use these a lot, however they have never failed me yet even after getting wet from a dunk in the river.

I made this type of starters when I was younger. Now I just carry a few candle stubs instead.
They are great fire starters, but I guess as I got older and lazier I just found candles easier.

Just remember to be careful when melting the wax since it can flame up if it gets too hot. That would be a nasty fire.

I always used a home-made double-boiler by placing a pie pan filled with water on the burner, and then putting the pot with wax inside the water. That makes sure that the wax pot won't get too hot.

Some folks use a microwave and watch it carefully to juuuust melt it and not more (not overheat it).

Also, you can get "new" parrafin (wax) from any local store that sells canning supplies - usually a local hardware store. Works well.

Ken

Hmm, the match heads might help with getting the egg carton pieces lit, but I never had a problem just with igniting the wax soaked cardboard with a lit match on it's own.

I prefer dryer lint to wood chips. I can make a lighting wick using the lint by pulling a piece up along the edge of the carton section and leaving it loosely spun and wetting it with hot wax. I've lit it using just sparks.

I can imagine that lint and wood chips would be a good combo

I've placed a piece of charcoal into each egg compartment and then coating with wax. Similar idea and also works well. Also, if you have little kids around, old crayons make an inexpensive (or free) source of wax. I completely soak the egg carton so everything is coated with wax.

Excellent photos and write up.

Good project. I think candle wax is sometimes overlooked in favour of Vaseline, but wax is generally as good and often easier to work with because it's less messy. (Unless the weather is very hot.)