Being from the northern climes, I obsess about firemaking in the winter. I went out to my unheated shed recently to test a couple of cheap butane lighters that I had left out there for a few weeks. I thought that maybe a 6 inch pillar candle could provide fume free all-night heat in a car stuck on a rural road in a snowbank, a situation I have had the pleasure of being in. It was about 5 degrees below zero, and as expected the lighters did not light. I slid them into my gloves for 5 minutes while I puttered around in the shed, and they worked just fine. I lit the frozen pillar candle and within 10 minutes, the top half cracked into pieces, split right through. Back to the drawing board there. Anyway, here are my questions:

1. Looking at the SHOT show gadgets, I see that Zippo makes a fire starting kit in a metal Zippo-sized case...Why not just carry a Zippo?

2. If a $1 butane lighter works well wet or dry in any weather (as my personal test seems to indicate) why wouldn't a person's backup be another $1 butane lighter?

3. Why (for the love of Pete) would anyone carry a fire piston???