So it was a cold, blustery evening in beautiful Pasadena and I decided to try out my Strikeforce sparker in a controlled environment. First I made sure my lovely assistant was available for morale support and mountain lion abatement duty.





Next, I grabbed my hatchet and chipped off some nice thick bark and wood chips from an old stump in the backyard.







I wish I knew what type of tree this was but I don't, hopefully some armchair botanist on the forum can help me out. I used half a pellet of the wax impregnated cotton tinder that came with one of the various fire making systems I have as the base.



(shown atop the Strikeforce for scale.)


I then experimented with different configurations of using the wood chips and bark as both kindling and fuel. The Strikeforce reliably provided the abundant sparks and the tinder fired right up.








The wood chips worked great! They easily caught fire and were blazing away long before the tinder pellet was consumed, the bark on the other hand didn't do so well. If I had a good, strong fire going with the chips, I could add the bark to the flames and it would slowly fire up but only stay lit as long as the chips burned.


I don't get it, the bark was thick, bone dry and looked like it would be the perfect fuel but in reality, bark (or at least this variety), would have failed me in a survival situation.


Your thoughts...